


Embers Ablaze

by PsychicAbsol



Series: Points! [12]
Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types
Genre: Abuse, Anniversary, Child Abandonment, Choking, Clairvoyance, Cooking, Dogs, Drug Use, F/F, Fire, Hospitals, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Lesbian Character, Letters, Mild Language, Minor Violence, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Moving, Nightmares, Poetry, Pregnancy, Psychic Abilities, Psychic Violence, Toddlers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-01
Updated: 2015-12-05
Packaged: 2018-04-24 07:33:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 25,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4910722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PsychicAbsol/pseuds/PsychicAbsol
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“And as the flames died down, all that was left were the broken remains of their existences, and the smoldering embers.” A collection of short stories, following the “Point” pieces “Flashpoint” and “Chokepoint”, depicting the life of the Toxic-Winters after tragic befell them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: As the summary indicated, a wide assortment of short stories taking place in the “Point” universe/series, (almost) all of them dealing with the aftermath of Sabotage’s attack.

**I “Out of Reality”**

The differentiation between dream and reality can be a tricky one. There are the usual thumb’s rules of how a person’s face will be blurred once one tries to concentrate on mimic details, or how you cannot feel being pinched in a dream. Some say that it may be effective to count to five, or to ask yourself the existential “Is this real, or am I dreaming right now?”. 

Some people swore that in dreams, you found yourself never wearing pants, but this was a notion applying to her mothers, and not only in dreams, evidently. 

Of course, the same people say that you cannot die in a dream, but Lexie knew this to be a lie. Dreams were the only place where she had experienced something that might come close to the definition of ceasing to live. 

Of course, being a psychic, being out of the ordinary, her dreams were, too. She remembered waking up many a nights when she was a pre-schooler, crying in fear, whimpering in pain or screaming in anger at something she wasn’t sure of its palpability. She remembered her mother coming to her bed every so often, calming her down as she set the cup of tea down next to her bedside and helping her find the finer nuances of what made reality real, and dreams imaginary. 

But she also told her that her figments of imagination were special. ‘You are psychic, and thus, you are, to a certain degree, clairvoyant.’ 

Lexie had nodded, filing the new word into her personal dictionary under things that defined her. Of sharp mind as she was, nevertheless she was still a child, and thus, in her eyes, her mum was the greatest soothsayer to ever exist, and she hung on every word she told her about this strange new phenomenon that had invaded her nightly slumber. And even though she had many visions the following years, some hard to interpret, some as clear as her reflection on the smooth surface of her mirrors, she always held firm the belief that whenever something crucial was about to happen, it was her mum that was going to foresee it, not her. 

It was a hot, sticky night, full of chirring and croaking, when she tossed herself around in her sheets. Nightmares were a special kind of ordeal for her. Nightmares were the most difficult hurdle to master when it came to distinguishing between reality and fiction. Nightmares were tied together tightly with so many intensely private emotions which made it hard to to dissociate oneself from them. Most often, they reflected inward phobias that were not all that unrealistic. And they had the tendency to scare her to the point where she felt she must have lost control over her body, her feelings, her thoughts, her powers, everything. 

It was a false rumor that psychics tended to remember their dreams more clearly. Psychics were not any more adapted at lucid dreaming than the average person was. Neither were they naturally better at remembering their visions. It took long, arduous years of practice to be able to recall the precise events of a vision. Lexie was still in the process of acquiring that kind of ability. 

And thus, she woke up from repose, wide-eyed and taking short, staccato breaths, from a nightmare she could not remember clearly. She shook her head, trying to clear it of all irrelevant perceptions, finding that her mind felt as if it was filled with sour cotton candy made out of black bile. Everything was foggy, and nothing took shape, no matter how much she willed it to. All that was left was silhouettes, one standing, one seemingly falling, in a milky, pastel-colored room without concrete objects, and the concomitant feeling of dread. 

Lexie tried to rub the sleep out of her eyes and took a glance at her alarm clock, registering that it was barely half past four in the morning, and she still had a bit time left before it she was forced to peel herself out of the sheets and go to school. She momentarily contemplated going to her mum and telling her about this strange, vague nightmare, but she decided to go back to sleep in face of fatigue and the knowledge that, likewise, interrupting her mum’s slumber was not a clever idea. Either she would just earn her scorn, or she would interrupt actions that she’d been proud to have been able to avoid all her life so far. 

A day later, and continuing into weeks and months and even years later, Lexie wondered if she’d would have been able to change the future, had she not fallen asleep shortly after, but instead talked to her mother that night. She wondered if they together would have recognized the danger, if they together would have found a way to prevent what came over them like a tidal wave of fire and destruction. She wondered if they would have hand waved the plain idea of Sabotage being any more than the loathsome pest she’d been ever since she had began inhabiting a human body, further fuelling their and her grief and guilt. She wondered if all of this brooding had any point, was, in any way, helpful, and came to the sad conclusion that no, it wasn’t. 

Whatever the intention of the cruel God that had decided to send her that vision the day before her mom died had been, it certainly hadn’t been to warn. If anything, it was merely to mock her.


	2. Out Of Reach

**II “Out of Reach”**

Remembering the times together with her girlfriend before now seemed like reaching into a bottomless pit, trying to retrieve what was hidden from your hand in the pitch black darkness of endlessness. Lexie knew these memories to have existed, these events to have taken place, but they could as well have been pictures out of a television documentary, that was how distanced she felt from them. 

This night could as well have been their first night together, and, by Arceus, this was how they celebrated it, in spite of all that had occurred and was likely to occur soon. 

She had not wanted to cry, but it was all a play-pretend she was staging here. It was futile to pretend she was happy, or that the sex took her mind off of all the dread it was filled to the brim with. Maybe it worked for seconds, but in the overall picture, Lexie knew she was merely delaying the inevitable, and that was, to have to say goodbye to her best friend. 

Not that she did not try! Oh Arceus, she tried to shush all these unwelcome thoughts out of her mind, to only concentrate on the one thing that mattered in the here and now, and that was, the dark-blond hair within her grip and the dark lips pressed onto her own, gnawing at skin that had been bathed in tears. But the heat of the moment overwhelmed her and her mind, and by the time that the sun decided to creep over the window sills into the living room onto whose couch they were draped upon, she was crying again. Tears of total silence, soon to be mixed with words uttered out of sheer despair. 

She did not want to leave Tammy! She did not want to leave her life, her old life, as it was soon bound to become labeled in the dictionary of her biography. Unlike her mom, she began to begrudge change, because, as she noted with sharp bitterness, change was not always good for you. Sometimes, change meant losing something you had been very content with owning. Sometimes, change was something she would have gladly refused if her input had been worth anything. 

She held tight onto her girlfriend's shoulders and told her as much in less sophisticated words, face buried in her chest. Lexie didn’t feel like caring that her nose was running, or that she had run out of breath long ago and her words came out like ghosts of language. It all just made this moment much more real, helping to conserve it unlike the memories of a former life that would soon become artificial and unreal to her, like a dream vaporizing at dawn. 

“I was not asked! I understand that she wants to move away, no one wants to stay where mom died, but why does it have to be so far away? Why does it have to be so sudden? Wasn’t there enough happening all of the sudden recently?” She asked, the anger in her voice hidden under layers of exhaustion. She could still remember the many times when she had met her mothers sitting at the coffee table in the morning, enjoying breakfast together after a night which they had spend in blissful elation, with her nearly buried under her mattress and it stung to think of them and their joyful exhaustion, while hers was more of a broken, devastated kind. 

She fell into breathless, silent sobbing again, soon crying herself asleep. 

When Billy came back home just a few hours later, she thought her daughter and Lexie to be fast asleep, but she was wrong. While Lexie might have been dozed off, brought down by emotional feeblenss, Tammy was awake with her eyes closed, mulling over her options. She waited until her mother was upstairs before freeing herself from the tangled mess she and Lexie had become, slowly putting her girlfriend into a more comfortable position while making sure that she stayed asleep, and sneaked up into her own room. 

It felt odd to have a whole room to have to call her own, but much crazier was the fact that now, she owned her own computer along with it. Before, all she had was a hand-down mobile without contract, and going online had been a question of frequenting the library. Now, a wide assortment of information lay bare to her feet, and she was going to put that to use. 

She felt a momentary pang of pain fill her chest as she booted up the computer, the first thing greeting her being the desktop wallpaper, a pic taken at the reunion concert, of her mother and her hugging, with Lexie and her mom still visible at their sides, their faces sweaty and yet full of unrestrained gratification. Tammy fought against the momentary impulse to change the picture to something less offensive as she realized she did not have any time to waste. 

Opening up the search engine and typing the words “Orange Island visa regimentations”, she noticed a pamphlet cast aside carelessly, given to them by a guest speaker who had recently visited their school, and as soon as the first result plopped up, an idea began to form within her mind… 

Scene Change

It had taken her almost a whole hour to get everything important printed out- having never owned a printer before either was certainly a disadvantage nowadays, before she stormed down the stairs. There, she was greeted by her mother, the smell of freshly brewed coffee and cigarette smoke heavy in the air around, but at least it was better than the sickly aroma of alcohol in the early morning. 

“Get dressed, whore…” Billy instructed, but despite the subject matter, the statement had lost its sharpness, further accentuated by the fact that Billy took a sip of night-black coffee the next moment, instead of dipping the hot beverage over her daughter’s head. 

Tammy managed to keep herself from retorting that she _was_ dressed, just not in as much clothing as usual at this time of the day. Arguing now would do nothing to support her point and only squander precious moments. 

“Where’s Lexie?” She asked, voice even. 

“Home already.” 

Tammy braced herself. She had said she was moving tomorrow, right? That meant she still had time...minutes she needed to talk to her mother, to convince her of her plan. 

Taking a deep breath, she sat down at the table site opposite of her mother, the dozens of pages neatly stacked upon each other placed besides her elbow. 

“Mother, we need to talk.” It felt odd to say this, and not feel the slap of a bare hand on her cheek next. She had, admittedly, never tried to reason with her mother in such a delicate, civilized way before. She had never seen the possibility of it working in her favor, honestly. 

Billy evidently was likely taken aback, but to a much smaller degree than Tammy herself was by her words. She merely glanced at her daughter of the rim over her cup, plucked eyebrows raised expectantly. 

“Then open your mouth and speak for yourself.” 

Tammy took a deep breath. “Lexie says she’ll be moving away soon. To the Orange Islands. To Shamouti. That’s where her family has a vacation home.” 

Billy set her cup down and hummed thoughtfully. Her mother might have drowned one or the other brain cell in alcoholic solutions, but she was not harebrained. “Understandable. They don’t have a roof over their head now that her freak mother burned it down.” 

Sometimes, Tammy wondered just how much of the truth had seeped through to her mother, and then, she realized she had to be glad it had not been all of it. Not that her mother would ever be worried about her daughter getting herself involved with a bunch of psychopaths. No. If anything, Billy would have been glad that someone took on the job of cracking her daughter’s skull open and stir the insides for her. 

There was a pause in which Tammy shuffled through the papers, well aware that her mother was only playing the uninterested bystander. If anything, she had long since started to connect the strings in her mind. 

“Mother, I…” Tammy sighed. There had been a time in her life during which such a proposal would have cost her her head, and all things considered, scooting away would have been the better choice. But while she was sure she would have made a life on the streets of Saffron, or anywhere else, there was still the matter of her brother, who couldn’t even get dressed without her help. She would have never left him all on his own, with a mother who would rather spend her last cent on funky pills for herself than on medicine for her sick son. 

“I want to move in with Lexie, and follow her to Shamouti.” 

Silence. Instinctively, Tammy still tensed and waited for the impact, either the verbal or the physical one, it had never mattered which one came first, as the other was bound to follow. She kept her eyes closed for so long that she nearly felt herself falling asleep again, out of courtesy of not having had much sleep last night, before her mother’s grumbling ripped her back into reality. 

“You seriously want to move in with that whore’s daughter?” She snickered. Again, the literal meaning of the derogatory word was weakened by the humourous way in which her mother accentuated it. There was no doubt that once, Billy had really meant to hurt with her words, hurt both Tammy and Lexie’s mom indirectly, but by now, it was merely a habit held dear, just like Tammy herself liked to call Lexie ‘freak’. 

Billy sighed. “And how exactly did you fancy your move? Think you can just crimp yourself into their suitcases and hope they don’t x-ray you on the airport? I also heard that the cargo area is not heated, so if I were you, I’d bring the thick coat, even if you land on a tropical island.” 

Tammy almost laughed, before figuring it was better for her to stay serious for the remainder of the discussion. 

“No. I want to go the legal way, mother.” She licked her lip, taking out the pamphlet first. “Have you ever wondered how it is possible for ten-year olds to journey across the world without their parent’s supervision?” 

Billy, who had been in the process of lighting her second cigarette, shrugged. “Because the government makes a fortune out of the trainers’ fees, there are enough ten-year olds that there’s always fresh supply in case some croak on the road, and most parents are happy to be free of all duties after years of wiping your asses?” 

Tammy wanted to look up and tell Billy straight away that the only kind of ass wiping she had ever received was of the painful kind, but knew better than that. It was, she mulled silently, nice to have a mother around her who could not read thoughts, after all. 

“No. It’s the so called trainer’s visum. It’s pretty spectacular, as the regulations and rules are the same for every country. It allows trainers from every country to visit literally every other country, on behalf of being a trainer and challenging the local league, or participating in contests, or whatever they long for. All they need is a registration fee, verification that they’re a trainer, a license and a Pokemon itself should suffice, and, of course, the permission of their parents. 

She would have expected her mother to jump straight to the most difficult hurdle ín the first place, and that was, of course, the permission. Even by Orange Islands laws, Tammy was not of age yet, thus complicating the plan. But instead, Billy pointed out another significant flaw. 

“Correct me if my demented, fractured memory is wrong, but you’re not a trainer…” She sneered. “Neither have you ever shown any interest in Pokemon…” 

Tammy leaned back and shrugged. “As I said, the requirements are regulated in a fairly easygoing way. As long as you have a licence and a single Pokemon, you are a trainer, by legal definition. I think that much is manageable for me.” As brash as it sounded, after having taken care of her brother for more than half a decade, she felt she could handle any Pokemon. “There’s even no need for me to officially challenge the league during the first year there. And even if questions are asked after the first visa runs out, I can always mock-challenge a gym and the licence as well as the visa get extended automatically. It’s not troublesome at all.” 

“And the Pokemon itself? Its food, medicine care, everything? How will you pay for that, given that I don’t think your host family will pay for your sorry cunt?” 

Not as if her mother could now pay for her, after finally getting some profitable gigs herself. Tammy, though, would rather bite her tongue off than asking her mother for financial support. Instead, she shrugged “I’ll find myself a job, won’t I? I’m not demanding in that regard, whatever works, works. And the Pokemon Center are free of charge.” 

Billy shrugged herself. Not that she had ever cared. And Tammy was not the one going to tell her that, in theory, the trainers did pay for the centers by virtue of the fees. And even these were reduced or exempt for trainers coming from poorer families. Tammy knew she’d have to take a look at the requirements to see if she qualified, now that her mother actually made money. 

Another long moment of silence, followed by a deep sigh coming from Billy. Tammy found it amazing that her mother still had the lung capacity of a marathon runner even after over thirty years of constant smoking, but some organs seemed to be made out of iron. If anything, her mother’s ability to holler, both at her and into the mic, was proof of her physical constitution. “So you want to leave me for your little girlfriend?” 

“Yes.” There was no reason to sugarcoat it. Things may have mellowed out between them, and Tammy felt glad that she now got a glimpse at what normal family life was supposed to be like, without the constant fear of getting beaten over something she did or said, or had no control over otherwise, but all of that meant shit when it came to years full of abuse. These wouldn’t be washed white just by some petty smiles and laudations. 

Billy sneered and clasped her chest, mocking fatal shock. “You hurt me! Your poor, old mother, all alone by herself in this big, empty house, in the cold, cruel city…” 

Tammy refused to roll her eyes and just stared straight ahead, hoping that this gesture made it clear enough to her mother how ridiculous she sounded when she claimed emotional abuse being inflicted upon her as a result of being abandoned by her daughter. The sheer idiocy of this notion made Tammy want to punch her mother straight through the nose, but she knew better than to instigate a fight. “You still have Ronny.” It was more of an order than a statement. 

Billy immediately stopped snickering and her face turned into a stony mask. “Ronny. Yeah. I’m so glad for the company of a strong, brave man at my side.” 

Now it was Tammy’s turn to laugh, even if she felt bad at her brother being mocked for something he wasn’t at fault at. If anything, it _was_ her mother’s wrongdoing causing him to be as he was, nowadays. “Well, if you weren’t such a loser when it comes to keeping the guy you sleep with, you wouldn’t have to be all alone now.” 

Billy snorted. “Don’t get me started on your father! I swear, I don’t even know now why I even sucked that cock of his, sex with him was like banging a Slaking, and I’m not talking about the size, girl.” She took a puff of her cigarette, at least being civil enough not to blow it straight into Tammy’s face. “I think to this day, his best efforts at claiming he’s not your biological father stem from the fact that he suffers from erotic amnesia.” 

Now, Tammy had serious trouble keeping herself from bursting with mirth. It was such a new, such an abnormal situation for her to laugh _with_ her mother, and not her mother laughing _at_ her, that she almost choked on her tongue when she instinctively tried to stop herself. 

The atmosphere immediately turned serious again, when Billy stopped chortling. In the past years, whenever her mother had stopped laughing after a crude joke she had made herself, it was a clear sign for Tammy to duck her head straight in and try to take cover, for it meant that the time of playful pokes and nips was over, and instead, it was time for the punches and slaps. 

This time, though, Billy’s sincerity was dipped in another flavor, and Tammy wasn’t sure what it meant when she felt her stomach curl into itself tightly at the stern face her mother gave her as she snipped the end of the cigarette into the ashtray and sighed. “You are serious about this, aren’t you?” She almost smiled, but with Billy, an almost smile could as well have been the last thing you saw before she hit you so hard your chin caved in. “You are totally over heads and heels in love with this girl, and you would follow her to the end of the world and beyond, come hell or high water, right?” 

Tammy didn’t think her mother’s question qualified for an answer, but she nodded, either way. 

Billy snickered. “You remind me of that cunt herself, Roxie….you know…” She glanced out of the kitchen window, out into the garden. Tammy regretted it a bit, but in the weeks following the move-in into the new house, she had ensured at great lengths that the garden would be kept up in quality with the house itself, and she had planted all sorts of flowers in the front yard, fully knowing that if not for her, they would dry up and shrivel away soon. Now she was going to move away, and all her work would be for naught. 

“She followed me, right back to Unova, when she….” Billy sighed, trailing off without ever finishing the sentence. “Never mind. It’s of no importance. It’s in the past, and that bitch is rocking in hell now.” Tammy wondered if that slightly dreamy outlook on her mother’s face meant that she was looking forward to a special kind of reunion, but that glimpse at actual empathic movement within her parent was gone as soon as it had come. 

Either way, Billy shook her head. “I could stop you, you know. I am still your mother, I was the one who signed the papers, and you are still living under my roof. But…” She turned to Tammy, face still as stern as before. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned when growing up in Virbank, it’s that no one ever leaves for good. Sure, spread your wings and try to fly.” She leaned on her elbow, last inches of her cigarette slowly burning down while she eyed her almost adult daughter with something Tammy could not classify. Was it judgement, or arrogance, or even pride? “You live a different life than I do, Tammy, and I guess by all the similarities that are between us, in the end, we are different. And no matter how many times I’ll try to beat the living snot out of you, I won’t make you into a copy of myself, now, will I?” She laughed, a haughty, empty laugh. “Or maybe you did that yourself, following the girl of your dreams into the pitch black darkness, where you cannot see and all you have for a guideway is her delicate violinist’s hand. If she falls, both of you will fall. I tell you, Tammy, that is the risk you take now. If she fails, then you’ll crumble with her. And you can bet your naked, sore butt that I won’t be there to take the fall for you and break my back in the process, brat.” She had finally finished her cigarette. “That’s your responsibility now, Tammy. I won’t hold you back.” She shrugged. “I wouldn’t have held you back if you ran away, either. Jinx the cops onto my ass, the good it would have done me, but care about you? Hah, you bet….” 

Tammy hadn’t noticed that she had been kneading her hands the whole time, nervously scratching at her fingernails. 

“If it’s my signature under a piece of toilet paper that you need, you’ll get it. If I need to sign any more papers for you, certifying that you’re a class A idiot and I’m ashamed to call you my daughter, and that I would rather slurp a drink made of rodenticide and salt acid out of the toilet and disown you than to take you back if something goes awry, be me guest, you’ll get it with a kiss on your ass cheeks. But don’t expect me to come and help you, no matter how deep the shit is. Marry that girl and adopt a dozen nigger skinned kids, or fall under the illusion that her bastard children are actually yours like that cunt did, you have my unholy blessing, if you need as much. But don’t come for help when you come back. And you will come back. You’ll always come back, Tamara. Everyone with Virbank blood in themselves comes back. But when you do, then I want you to come back with your head high enough so that you can spit on mine, and not crawling on your fours, begging your old hag of a mother for help.” 

Tammy might have been fighting back a tear or two, but she nodded.


	3. Out Of Reach- Part II

**III “Out of Reach- Part II”**

Tammy only now began to realize the kind of advantages being together with a psychic brought with it. No matter what kind of fear her girlfriend’s mothers had tried to evoke in her, it was undeniable that teleport was a very helpful technique when you wanted to get from one quarter of the city to another. You also reached your goal with the help of the usual public transportation systems or by foot, but, by Arceus, the time wasted by these mundane activities was immense.

She felt somewhat pressed for time, even if she knew Lexie not to be moving by at least another twelve hours. Still, with her plans tucked under her arms, she was nervous. For once, because she still had no clue if everything would and could work out the way she had planned, and furthermore, because there was still the variable of Lexie and her family in play. She hoped with all of her heart that Lexie would be okay with her moving in. It was her smallest worry, really, but it was still a worry that kept her pace up in a frenzy. 

And even with Lexie being the agreeable on, there was still her mother. Tammy shuddered at the thought of confronting the psychic again. Psychic powers themselves had never scared Tammy much- she wouldn’t have been able to bully Lexie in school if that had been the case, but psychic powers wielded by someone who was certainly out of her mind was another thing entirely. And now that ‘out of her mind’ was heightened by a grief so intense it seemed unreal, and Tammy seriously began to wonder if the most difficult part of her plan wouldn’t be to convince _her_ mother, but _Lexie’s_. 

She didn’t know, either, if she should feel relief at the fact that she was greeted not by Lexie’s mother, but by her grandmother at the door of their interim home. 

The older woman with the warm smile and dark brown hair shook her hand. “You are lucky, Lexie just got home as well.” Just as she had uttered these words, the younger psychic walked through the backdoor into the hallway, blinking away missing sleep, or overdue tears out of her eyes. 

“Tammy…”? She asked, not sure if she was looking into the eyes of a ghost. Her mind, in preparation of things to come, had already shut off all connections with the guitarist, or at least tried to. 

Tammy smiled wildly. “Your mother’s home?” She asked after a moment, when Lexie’s grandmother had excused herself in order to leave her grandchild and her friend alone. 

Lexie shook her head. “She just went to the doctor’s, like I told you.” 

“Oh, right…” Tammy tried to remember, but her mind had been filled with details more important, and had thus erased all traces of appointments not relevant to her. All things considered, this was probably a good thing. If she had Lexie convinced of the feasibility of her plan, then maybe it would be easier to convince her mother as well. 

“Can we talk? In private? Maybe…” She shrugged. “Somewhere else?” Not that she wasn’t okay with the here and now, but in matters this important, it was better to create an atmosphere that prevented interruptions, and with Lexie’s younger siblings crawling the floor, they were bound to have to fight for attention. 

“Eh, okay, where, then?” Lexie asked, hesitantly. Tammy felt a pang of pain at seeing her girlfriend this distraught, and feared that Lexie was already interpreting her motivation wrongly. She almost clasped her shoulders right away, telling her in no uncertain words that she was not going to break up with her, but the overall picture was firmly cemented in her mind, and once she had that explained to Lexie, there would be no need to worry anymore. 

“Wherever you wanna go….” Tammy therefore said, a warm smile on her face for her girlfriend’s sake. 

Some part of her was then a bit discouraged to see Lexie teleport them to a tatty inner city diner. She didn’t ask for reasons, though. 

She didn’t beat around the bush, either. “Lexie, I want to move in with you...and your family.” She added at last second, momentarily forgetting that it was not her girlfriend alone that was in charge now. 

Lexie blinked, so taken aback by the sudden declaration that she forgot to order for them. The waitress seemed not to be irritated by this, though, Tammy noted. If anything, she seemed wary of the psychic teenager. “You want to...move in with me? With us? But…” She looked at the floor, eyes tearing up already again. “I told you we’re moving away soon…” 

“I know, Lexie, and that is exactly why I want to move in with you.” She put her hand above Lexie’s, and grabbed a handkerchief with the other, so that Lexie wouldn’t have to bare the embarrassment of crying in public. Not that anyone would begrudge her for it, Tammy assumed. The public of Saffron knew well enough what their gym leader’s daughter was going through, after all. 

“I want to stay with you, no matter where you go. I love you and I would not leave you alone. Not, _especially_ not in this situation. I do not want to freeload. I want to help you and your family get through this tight time. Believe me, I have been through...similar.” Tammy bit her tongue. There were things, things about her childhood, that she had not told Lexie yet. In a way, she was glad that the girl differed enough from her mother to refrain from reading her mind unquestioned, as she was sure her mother already knew about the darker chapters of her early childhood, the years she had spend with her father, and his girlfriend. It was not the same, certainly not. She had never lost a loved parental figure, given that she never had such a thing in the first place, and you could hardly surrender something you had never been in the possession thereof. But she could empathize enough to know that the pain of what Lexie was going through was enormous in comparison to her own agony. 

“And I know that you need help. I don’t want to patronize you, please understand...I simply want to _help_. And I know I can do that by being with you. I hope I don’t sound selfish, this is not my intention at all…” She was wringing her hands, hardly able to contain the words that formed within her mouth before her mind had any chance of authorizing them. 

Lexie shook her head, cheeks blotchy with tears and reddened by prevailing emotions. “No, no, it’s not, Tammy, I just…” She sniffed. “I just didn’t think...this is nothing you have to do for us. For me, I mean.” She looked up, looking so meek and petit now that Tammy could hardly believe her to be one of the strongest living psychics. She looked more like a brittle porcelain doll now. “Moving somewhere you have never been before...that’s a big step, and I don’t want you to be put under the same strain just because of me.” 

“Lexie...Lexie, please, just look me straight into the eyes, okay? This is not about me. This is definitely not about me. And not fully about you, either. It’s about _us_. Us, as a team.” She squeezed Lexie’s hand, still hidden beneath her own. “I do not want to leave you, and I hope I am correct in assuming that you do not want to leave me, or this city, your _home city_ , the place of your birth, either.” 

“It’s your birth place too…” 

Tammy shrugged. “Actually, I was born in Goldenrod, but I don’t think that matters right now.” She giggled a bit. “But you’re right insofar as I do not want to leave Saffron, either. But if I have to choose between this city, that has never given me anything but a kick into the ass...well, aside from you and the band, of course…” Tammy stopped herself short, and shook her head. “Never mind, if I have to choose between staying here _without_ you, and going somewhere I have never been before _with_ you, well, I know what I would, and _will_ choose.” 

Lexie was at a loss of words, and thus, rather than speaking, she just shook her head, and with it, came the sobbing again. She had thought to lose so much more in such a short amount of time. As if it wasn’t enough for fate to tear her away from her mom, she had to leave everything that had ever mattered to her away from her grip, as well. The music, that had always been her passion. Her friends, the pillar upon which she had supported much of her joyfulness. Her home, the place where she had found peace and rest. And her girlfriend, for whom she had fought with nails and teeth, only to lose her the moment everything had seemed to have sorted itself out. It was cruel irony, really. And thus, it was hardly believable for her that from all the things that she could _not_ carry over with her to Shamouti for various reasons, her girlfriend was the one thing that followed her of her own free volition. 

“I never...I never thought….I thought…” 

Tammy snorted. “That I would abandon you? That I would leave you crying in the rain, once things go sour? That I would leave you in the mud, to rot on your own? To spit at you and your misfortune, and laugh at your weakness? No, Lexie.” She shook her head. “If I may be so selfish as to say this, but I am a better person than that. No matter the difficulties, I will be there for you.” 

“But...the band…” 

“Lexie, _fuck the band_. Forgive me the harsh words, but _fuck them_. This is not about the band, and sorting things out with them. The band is not important right now. Sorting out _your life, that_ is important right now.” She shrugged. “How does the saying go? The show must go on. The show _will_ go on. But first and furthermost, your _life_ has to go on. And the way I see it, I can help you with that. I can help you with your siblings, with the household, with everything...I can be there for you.” 

Lexie seemed to have calmed down in the meantime. Enough at least to ask the questions Tammy had actually been expecting. “But, how will you do that? You’re still under your mother’s custody.” 

“I am, but she has agreed to let me go.” At Lexie’s widening eyes, Tammy shrugged. “It wasn’t that hard to convince her, actually. But all of that is my problem. I have figured out a way for me to stay on Shamouti within the lawful regulations. I will warn you in advance, it will force me to adopt a Pokemon, but…” Tammy shrugged again. “I think that is, all things considered, a minor inconvenience. And who knows, maybe it will actually be fun, training a Pokemon for once…” 

Lexie seemed wary, but then, she had never been enthusiastic about the training profession. 

“And really, that’s all that there is to it. My mother has agreed, and the legal foundation has been laid out. If your mother has no objections, I am free to move in with you.” There was still the matter of all the paperwork getting approved, but that was another minor inconvenience Tammy was sure she’d get through with enough time, patience and perseverance. 

Lexie sniffed, using the handkerchief to clean her eyes. “I can’t...I can’t believe...I can’t thank you enough, Tammy, for daring to go through all of this just for me. You are the sweetest girl I’ve ever met, do you know this?” She blushed, glancing sideways through the glass windows. 

Tammy leaned back, smirking. “Well, not bad for someone who identifies with the a rebellious punk rocker movement, to be called sweet….” 

Lexie laughed, and Tammy felt relieved at a thousand ice bags leaving her stomach at the sound of that, a sound she had missed. 

The irritated champing of the waitress next to them burst their little bubble of happiness. 

“You finally picked something?” She asked, eyes rolled upwards as if to shorten the time before brain death arrived and enwrapped her with the cold clasp of its spider fingers. 

Lexie’s smirk should have alerted her. “Surprise us.” 

The next thing Tammy registered was the gruesome shrieking of the employee, before she hurled the salt shaker after them.


	4. Out of Reach- Part III

**IV “Out of Reach- Part III”**

The sun was starting to disappear behind the horizon when Lexie came back home, heart filled with a flutter she hadn’t felt in a long time. She almost skipped the last steps up to the front door, and opened it with an eagerness she hadn’t felt in herself for days. As bleak as everything still was, all things considered, there was that tiny speck of hope now on her sky that she couldn’t help but concentrate on, knowing it would be her anchor of hope, and her way of pulling herself out of the storming sea. 

Still, she felt her body stop short when she saw her mother sitting in silence at the kitchen table, unmoving except for a slight trembling of the shoulders that Lexie registered as suppressed sobbing even from her point of view. She gulped, remembering that for every tear she shed, her mum seemed to swallow two more. 

Still, she gathered her courage and approached her. Her mother was unpredictable these days, and this knowledge was confirmed by the fact that, as soon as she noticed Lexie coming closer, she snatched the single sheet of paper lying between her elbows and turned it around so that Lexie could not identify the written words on it. 

“You were at the doctor’s, right?” The teenager started, hoping to ease the atmosphere right away by starting the conversation this way. She didn’t know that she was actually making it worse. “You’re alright?” 

Lexie certainly didn’t like the pause that accompanied her mother’s answer, but she had to be satisfied with the one word she got. “Yes.” Sabrina paused, breath coming in harder than before. “Yes.” 

There were times when Lexie knew her mother to be lying. It was a difficult task, to see through a psychic, especially one as strong and stoic as her mother. But Lexie not only had the material at her hand, but also the experience of having lived with her through her whole life, and thus, she knew when her mother was not telling the truth, or at least not telling the whole truth. 

Still, she decided not to press on the matter. One’s health was a personal matter, and while she would have preferred her mum to confide in her- especially given as how she was her only parent left living, she also accepted her decision of keeping her own secrets. It was something, Lexie mused, that differed greatly between them. She had always accepted people’s privacy, and refrained even from reading her girlfriend’s thoughts. Her mum, on the other hand, seemed to regard everyone’s mind as an open book left for her to rummage through. There had been times when she had been fairly irritated at this behavior as a child, but time and experience had taught her to accept it as much as she accepted other people’s wishes for secrecy as well. 

Instead, she braced herself for the point of contact that would not doubt strike her once she laid out Tammy’s plan. After all, it did rely a lot on Sabrina’s acceptance, of her being okay with her daughter’s girlfriend moving in. All things considered, Sabrina was now the sole head of the house, if she hadn’t evidently been the one before, and everything concerning the household now stood and fell with her. 

“I met Tamara today, and there was an important matter she wanted to discuss with me. She has decided that she wants to move in with us.” Seeing that her mother didn’t interrupt and object right away, Lexie continued as fast as she could without leaving out any important detail, or sputtering in nerviness. 

To her surprise, her mother just listened quietly, with an unreadable expression that Lexie thought she had never seen on her face before. It was so entirely unemotional, so uncaring and cold, that she shivered physically. If there hadn’t been the occasional movement of the head, she would have though her mother not to be listening at all, having turned into fleshy stone. 

And when she came to the end of her story, all she got was an ungallant, gruffy nod, that could have expressed approval as well as disagreement, and was therefore of no informative value to her. 

Still, she took whatever she could get, and so, she tensely approached her mother, intending to put her hand on her shoulder. 

What she _did_ get that moment, though, was a spiteful hiss that made her reel back very fast. “Don’t touch me. Don’t even come near me.” 

Lexie obeyed, though it hurt her to do so. She knew her mother to be hurting, she knew that very well, and she knew it would take her long to recover, but it still pained her to be rejected this forcefully by the only parent she had left. 

Nevertheless, she wished her mother a good night as she retired to bed, hoping to stay in good spirits about the whole ordeal, and falling asleep with blissfully innocent and less than pure thoughts of Tammy on her mind.


	5. Out of Kanto

**V “Out of Kanto”**

Lexie supposed Tammy had every reason for the odd look she gave her as she unpacked her handbag on the plane, struggling a bit with the heavy box that threatened to make the fabric burst. 

To the unasked, but obvious question, she smiled weakly. “Javier gave it to me last morning, before we drove to the airport. He said it’s from all of them- all members of the band.” She sighed deeply, tracing the various, hastily scribbled messages on the cardboard, their originators barely distinguishable by handwriting alone. “I wanted to tell you about it yesterday, but you were still packing, and I didn’t want to hold you up. Besides, it’s for both of us, anyway.” Carefully, she balanced the box on her knees, so that Tammy, seated next to her, could take a glance at it, too. 

She opened it with her thumb, finding the sticky tape to be a weak barrier. The first thing that caught her eye was that the box was, in fact, filled with three smaller boxes, all of various sizes. She took the smallest one first, one which ‘From Ricky’ was emblazoned, with thick ballpoint ink. It was not really a box, truth to be told, but rather a thick envelope, filled with two sheets of papers. The first one was a note, with a few handwritten lines. 

‘I’m not good at these kinds of things so...I wrote you a poem. I hope you like it. I’m really not the best poet, though….’ 

She smiled at Tammy. “He’s underselling himself again, isn’t he?” 

Her girlfriend nodded, and silently shoved the note away from the second sheet of a paper, pastel rosé and hand-made. She was no expert, but she wouldn’t have been surprised if Ricky had taken the painstakingly effort and wrote the poem down with a real fountain pen. 

  
‘On Your Way; You Have to Go,  
For Reasons That Only You Yourself Might Ever Know  
Whisked Away In Winter’s Winds  
I’ll Ramble On In Kind  
Chasing Phantom Memories Behind 

  
You’ve Often Made Your Way  
Within The Dark, Within The Day  
But Never Been so Lonely  
How I Wish I Could Make it Okay!  
If Only, If Only  


  
Shun The Shadows Out Of Your Eyes  
See, The Sun! As it Arise!  
Flee Through Your Morning Sorrows  
For There’s Still Tomorrow  
High Up In The Skies’  


Lexie wiped away a tear from her eyes. “Oh, Ricky…” In another time, she would have jokingly asked him if he wanted this to be turned into the lyrics for a song. She had never expected him to be quite well with words, and now regretted not asking him to write a song for The Misfits, for as long as they had existed. It was certainly a missed chance. 

She passed the page onto Tammy, before opening the next box. With bright, golden letters, Mary-Ann had written her name on it, before deciding that, as per rule of the band, she was only “Mary”, and had crossed out her second name. Again, the first thing that fell into her hands was a short note. 

“Hello Lexie! 

I hope you’re alright and safe on your way to your new home when you read this! The thought of what I should give you as a farewell gift kept me up for days and nights long. It bothered me for so long that I almost forgot what I wanted to say here…” 

Lexie glanced at Tammy, and smiled. 

“I’m afraid I was not very creative with my gift. It was all very rushed, wasn’t it? I hope you still like it! Obviously, you can keep them! You can also put them into an album, if you want to! I would have done so myself, but there was simply no time, I’m so very sorry, and I didn’t know if you’d have liked it, sooo... 

I’m rambling on. I’m just so sorry that it had to end this way, Lexie. You were a great musician, and a great band leader! I’ll never forget you! 

Mary-Ann.” And again, her second name had been crossed out after a moment of thought. 

Lexie glanced at the content of the box, and gasped audible. Photos. Dozens of photos. Some blurry, some from far away, some almost professionally well, and some so very up close that the only their smashed noses and lips were visible. All and every single photo Mary had ever taken of them with her mobile phone. The first practice sessions, the rehearsals. The one time they went into a china restaurant together, and Ricky had been so dismayed to find that his fortune cookie told him, or rather _mocked him_ by telling him he’d look great in an Armani suit. And the afternoon when Javier had made them holler with laughter by eating his sushi with his drum sticks while keeping a most serious face. Their first concert, and all of them looking to be in various states of hysteria. Group pictures with the janitor, who was their first and most devoted fan. (And also their number one help when it came to technical support.) A pic together with Javier’s father, during a surprise visit from the experienced musician. Lexie flipped through every single pic, feeling her hands become sweaty and clammy as she realized what was bound to come up. 

And there it was. Pics from the backstage area in Saffron’s Grande Theatre, just minutes before she had performed with her mom. Roxie had been all too eager to take pics together with her band members, while Billy had lingered somewhere to the far right of the picture, barely anything more than her pony tail visible. And of course, Mary-Ann had added the one pic she had taken with Roxie together, the young pianist with wide open eyes, looking kind of sociopathic about it, actually, not believing what she was doing, while Roxie stuck her tongue out at her, and probably had been wiggling it as well, though that could not be carried along with a single photograph. 

Lexie’s hand was shaking so much that she barely noticed the pencil notes on the backside of that pic. Tammy had to make her aware of it, and read the note out loud, for Lexie realized she had started crying. ‘When I asked her for an autograph, she was dismayed to hear I did not want my panties signed, you know? I still have that signature, and I’ll keep it forever. Thank you for introducing me to her!’ 

Lexie, despite her best efforts, mixed crying and bemused laughter, and ended up choking on her tongue. Tammy silently patted her, before drawing her attention to the last, and largest object in the box. 

Lexie knew what it was before she even opened the package. She had felt it before, the same material, the same shape. She gasped for air as she unwrapped the record, hands shaking so much she feared she would drop it. 

And again, there was a note attached, and Tammy, noticing her girlfriend’s discomfort, choose to read it out loud for her, again. “It’s from Javier. Oh, and from his dad, he says. He said...when you told him that the LP had been destroyed in the fire, his father pulled out all stops to get a replacement. He said he was close to jinxing mother on the label…” Tammy blinked. “Mother? Who is Javier’s mother?” 

Lexie shrugged, not really caring about it. 

“Well, and somehow, with a tiny bit of blackmail, he was able to get the replacement rendered in time. It’s yours.” She smiled. “Oh, and he says, he got his father and Billy…” Tammy stopped, realizing she was talking about her own mother there. “He got his father and Billy to sign the cover, too. Emotional values, he says. You got a one of a kind exemplar there.” 

Lexie’s whole body, and she tried so hard, so very hard, so stop herself from crying, but it was just impossible. Not so long ago, this piece of otherwise unremarkable plastic would have been a symbol of her connection to her mom. Now, it was a symbol of the loss she had suffered.


	6. Out Of Prison

**VI “Out of Prison”**

“And you think this is totally okay…?” 

Tammy sighed, rolling her shoulders at her girlfriend as they entered the bleach-white building, the sounds of several unidentifiable Pokemon screams echoing along the hallways. “You’re the gym leader’s daughter, Lex, you tell me.” 

It seemed as if Lexie would retort something, but her little brother chose that moment to whine and demand to be set down, so she arched her back and put him on his feet, from where he sprinted to the cages. If it were up to him, they’d get home with not one, but half a dozen Pokemon, and likely the biggest and most impressive ones present at the shelter. 

“I think it’s….” She fiddled with the words. “...not traditional, but okay. It’s better than catching a Pokemon and rip it out of its natural territory, I think. And you do save a Pokemon that would otherwise be left to dwell behind cage bars for way too long, so….” She smiled, for her girlfriend’s sake, even if the ordeal in itself was uncomfortable to her. Too many animalistic thoughts all around her. “I think what you’re doing is right.” 

Tammy smiled back, before calling off Lenny, who was in the process of trying to feed his small hand to a Nidoking. Lexie was glad they’d left Leslie in her mother’s care, for paying attention to two toddlers all while looking for a Pokemon for Tammy seemed impossible. 

“Did you call the shelter’s direction or are we bargaining in?” 

Tammy hid her hands in the pockets of her pants. Coming in from the humid warmth of the island, the shelter’s tracts were filled with uncomfortable icy coldness. “I did. I think they were actually expecting me to announce your arrival, given that you’re the more likely candidate for a new trainer. I don’t think they even knew who I am….” 

Lexie giggled weakly. “All the better. I don’t think mum could stand anyone following us to the islands. She’s moody enough as she is…” 

Tammy nodded and opened her mouth to speak again, but before she could tell Lexie what had been on her mind recently, they were approached by a middle-aged, dark-skinned woman, wearing a pink, flower-patterned apron. “Good morning, my dears. I am Miss Kahale, and I lead this facility.” The way she was speaking and behaving herself, one would have thought she was the head of a manufacturing establishment, and not a public shelter funded by charitable donations. “And you are…?” 

“Tamara. Tamara Corkney. We spoke yesterday…” 

The woman blinked, her gaze lingering first on Lexie, than on Lexie’s younger brother, who was fascinated by a small, blue, dog-like Pokemon that continued to paw at him through glass pane. The psychic girl kept her gaze lowered, hoping not to get recognized. All things considered, she even felt a bit embarrassed to accompany her girlfriend, when she wasn’t the one in need of service. She was dully aware that some people had expected her to become a trainer from the moment on she was born, simply by grace of having two gym leaders as mothers, but that was simply not how it worked, in the end. If either Lenny or Leslie wanted to follow that path, they were free to do so, absolutely. 

As of right now, it seemed as if at least Lenny was not that opposed to the idea of owning a Pokemon big enough that he could ride it…. 

She would support her siblings, just as much as she supported Tammy with her unusual, slightly forced decision. But it was nothing she had ever persuaded for herself. 

The older woman paused, deep in thought for a moment, before the literal light bulb flashed on top of her head and she clicked her fingers. “Right, right. You were the newbie trainer, right? Come along, we have a wide section of Pokemon just right for a beginner, easy to handle, simple to train.” 

Lexie grinned. That sounded like a kind of ad slogan the league would support. 

They walked past dozens of glass chambers, all less than two feet wide, every single one of them inhabited by Pokemon of different species. Some of them didn’t even register the advent of the women, some lazily lifted their heads at the sound of steps, and some seemed deeply aggravated by their presence. Lexie reasonably wondered if it had something to do with her powers. 

Or the fact that Lenny was pounding on some of the glass doors, cheekily waking up the Pokemon inside. 

“Do you have concrete notions of what….” 

Lexie would never know what exactly the woman wanted to inquire, as the young girl noticed that her girlfriend had starting lagging behind them. It was, after all, kind of hard to keep her eyes on both her brother, who was trying to open each and every single door by himself, and being shushed by the shelter’s director, and also taking notice of where her girlfriend was wandering of to. Tammy had crouched in front of a particular large cage, its prisoner hidden by blankets and an abnormal large basket. 

Taking one glance back, and finding that Lennox was in the safe company of Miss Kahale, she approached Tammy, who spoke without being prompted to. 

“My mother used to have one of these…” And she pointed towards the basket, where a large, dog-like Pokemon with long, scrubby cream colored hair filled in all space. Just when Lexie came closer and registered that it was not only one shape, but several that were moving within the bedding did she realize that it was a mother Pokemon with her pups. 

“A Herdier?” 

Tammy shook her head, one hand pressed against the glass to support herself. “No, a Lillipup. She found it somewhere in Virbank, as a feral, sick and wounded Pokemon. Took it in, cared for it, nursed it back to health.” Tammy sighed. “Kept it for quite a few years, until her brother accidently crushed it under the bookcase when he was high on Arceus knows what. Mother told me he later used it as a missile against Team Plasma…” 

“Oh…” Lexie didn’t even know what to comment first. While she wasn’t surprised at the kind of treatment Pokemon received in Billy’s household- who would have expected anything else from a woman who regularly beat up her own daughter?, there were details she heard of here and now for the first time. “You have an uncle?” 

Tammy started to speak, but stopped to diligently select her words. “I _had_ two uncles. The older one- technically older, died from overdosing long before I was born. The younger one…” She shrugged, staring at the tiled ceiling. “No one knows where he’s banging around. Quoting mother, he’s a ‘cocksucking, trans-faggot with his brain up his arse’, so take of that whatever you want to. And for the sake of completeness, I have an aunt as well, who is stuck in Virbank, doing whatever she does, that is, likely prostitution and drugging her merry sanity away. All from my mother’s side of the family. No idea about my father’s side. He never talked about his family. Or anything personal, for the matter. I don’t even know his birthday. “ 

During the time it had taken Tammy to finish telling Lexie about this episode of her life story, one of the pups had taken notice of their visitors, and had, clumsily, used the chance to climb out of the basket and out of its mother’s reach. Now, it had jammed its pink nose against the glass wall, and whined, for there was no way for the little pup to bypass the transparent barrier. Lexie smiled and drew circles around the pup’s head, causing it to follow her finger with curious eyes as it futilely pawed around, still not aware of the fact that no matter how cute it behaved, the glass would not melt, unlike the hearts of many spectators presented with a baby Pokemon. 

“Dinky little things they are, not?” Miss Kahale said, coming up behind them with Lenny in tow. The pup noticed its enlarged audience, and went to great lengths to capture the attention of the young boy as well, finally succeeding insofar as that Lenny approached the door and started cooing the dog, not aware that it was unlikely the Lillipup would hear anything through the glass door. 

“Illegally imported from Unova.” The woman shrugged. “And then mass-bred by a hoarder. Nasty business, they are. Don’t have a licence, but sell the puppies, which are understandably rare here, cheaper than the official breeders. Don’t abide to any regulations or standards, instead breeding widely, just for profit.” She sighed deeply. “The parents are sometimes held in barns, dark, dirty sheds. They get fed with raw meat, slaughterhouse waste, bare bones, whatever is available and cheap. And the puppies get taken from their mothers at six weeks. Or younger. It’s horrible.” 

The woman glanced at the mother Herdier, who carefully eyed the three strangers that were interacting with her puppy. She didn’t seem to be stressed at all by the ordeal, though if that was because she knew the humans not to have any feasible way of hurting her puppy, or because she knew them to be trustful, that much was not within her knowledge. “We found her when she was very pregnant, starved half to death, flea-infested, and God knows what else. But as soon as we showed her some loving, gave her a warm place to rest and some food, she was the nicest girl we’ve ever had here at the shelter.” 

Lexie sighed, naturally feeling sorry for the mother Pokemon. There were no parallels between their stories, maybe aside from the general theme of hopelessness creeping into their lives, but still, she regarded the Herdier with high respect, a Pokemon that had been through so much, and still found it within her to care for her four puppies with all the might and love only a mother could possess. 

She supposed that, with all the information that had rained upon them just right now, their decision had been made before it could have been questioned in the first place. It didn’t help, either, that the young puppy in front of them had now stood up, balancing on its stubby rear legs and tried to lick them through the glass, confused as to why even this method to get rid of nasty obstacles did not work. Lexie took another glance at Tammy, and the look on her girlfriend’s face told her that it was just the same with her. She would not leave without one of the puppies now, either. 

Miss Kahale had, by no means, ever been a mind reader, but she didn’t need to be one to interpret the mimic of her customers rightly. “I see that you’ve already fallen in love with this little rascal.” 

Lenny looked up, momentarily confused as to why one would utter such a redundant statement about himself. Of course he was loved by his sissy and auntie Tammy! 

Lexie laughed. “The other rascal, Lenny. The one behind the glass.” That explanation didn’t help Lenny much, as, from a certain point of view- concretely, that of the puppy, he was just as much behind glass as the Pokemon itself was. 

Tammy sighed and stood up, stretching her cramped legs. “It appears so, Miss Kahale. Are the puppies already up for adoption?” 

“I’m afraid they are a bit too young for that, but come back in three weeks, and you can take them with you. If you want to, we can ever pre-register this little one on your name, and you can be sure that no one will snatch it away from under your noses.” Miss Kahale paused, before pulling out a bunch of keys, and opening the glass door. The puppy was so dumbfounded by the turn of events that it tumbled out of the room, causing its mother to utter a cautionary, guttural growl. Careful, the caretaker picked up the puppy, turning it on it stomach, much to the confusion of the young Pokemon. “Or her, rather. This puppy is a girl.” 

There was an audible sigh from Lenny, while Lexie and Tammy shared a mischievous grin. 

“That works for us, definitely.” Tammy answered, taking the chance to pet the Lillipups belly, earning a delightful squeal. The mother Pokemon likely seemed satisfied, as she laid her head down on her front paws, watching the strangers interact with her baby with mediocre interest, but always keeping at least one eye open. 

“Wonderful, wonderful. If you would come along for the registration process? You have your licence already, do you?” 

Tammy nodded, glancing sideways at Lexie. “You’ll wait here for me?” 

“Sure.” Lexie answered, knowing that she would have to explain to her brother that getting a female puppy did not, in any way, oppress his sole male presence in the family. If anything, it made him even more special, as he continued to be the only boy, the unique snowflake in a way. 

Scene Change

They were walking back from the shelter in contemplative silence, each of them having their own musing to dwell in. 

Lexie giggled. “You’re already thinking of a name, Tammy?” She winked, indicated that the thought of naming the pup was so prominent on Tammy’s mind that it was hard to get by unnoticed by any psychic, much less one emotionally so close to the guitarist. 

“Mhh, yes. I think I have an idea of sorts, but….we’ll have to see. I don’t want to give her a name that doesn’t suit her personality well. That could get awkward, later.” Tammy sighed, combing through her hair with sweaty fingers. At first, it had sounded like a good idea, getting rid of her mohawk now that she was away from the big city and living in the deepest of all provinces, but as a consequence, her once very short hair was now longer than she was used to, and her head heated up uncomfortably in the tropical sun. That was not the only thing bothering her, though. “Do you…” She fidgeted. “Do you think this was right?” 

Lexie raised an eyebrow at the repetition of the question. “Of course it was right! The puppies and their mother went through enough…” She paused momentarily, knowing that using swear words in front of her little brother was not a good idea. As much as she wanted to continue her mom’s legacy, she wanted to spare her siblings some experiences she had went through. She sighed. As morbid and painful as it was to admit, but her mom’s death meant that Lenny and Leslie at least didn’t have to live through daily nightly discontinuances, caused by the overactive sexual drives of their mothers. 

She fought back the tears that formed at the corners of her eyes. Arceus, even that was something she could live through, if it only meant her mom would return, but alas, she had long since given up hope of the impossible happening, and had, for herself, decided that the only way to move forward was to _look_ forward, and make the best out of the life she had, now. That was what her mom would have wanted her to, after all. Live her life to the fullest, know no boundaries, never to hold back. 

She coughed to regain her composure. “They’ve been through enough pain and suffering, and they should know a loving home. Don’t you think so, too?” 

Tammy sighed. “I know, and in all honesty, it is the only way for me to stay here, legally…” She almost laughed, but whatever it had been that had been lurking in her throat, it came out as a pitiful attempt at chuckling. “But, it’s a big responsibility...a young Pokemon is almost, if not outright just as much trouble and stress as a little kid. You need to train it, teach it, and there’s the bare essentials, like feeding it, keeping it healthy and motivated and busy so that it doesn’t gnaw your table-legs off…” She sighed. “And all of that, on top of two toddlers, soon to be three…” 

Lexie had been in the process of nodding, before she noticed Tammy’s odd wording and glanced sideways at her girlfriend, suspicion plainly visible. “What are you talking about there, Tammy?” 

Tammy, feeling wrongly accused, held up her hands in defence. “I am not talking about me, heavens above, Lexie!” She paused, blinking. “I was talking about your mother, actually.” 

Now it was Lexie’s turn to blink. “Mum? What do you mean?” 

Tammy stopped, staring straight into her girlfriend’s coral blue eyes. “You mean she didn’t tell you? And you didn’t notice either...oh, dear Lord…” 

“Tell? Notice? What are you talking about? Don’t tell me…” Lexie did have a very good feeling what Tammy was implying, actually, but it felt as if the ground beneath her feet was shifting sideways when she tried as much as focus on the gruesome possibility. 

“That she’s pregnant again? Well, yes, that is why...Lex, you _really_ did not know? She did not tell you?” 

“We haven’t talked much ever since we moved to Shamouti…” Lexie admitted, pushing away the sand beneath her feet uncomfortably. She shook her head, trying to clear it of all the awful implications of that fact. “But how do _you_ know? Did she tell you?!” 

“No, she didn’t, but where I grew up, women ended up pregnant more often than they wanted to...or than was comfortable, to be honest. I know the symptoms...fatigue, the mood swings, the headaches…” Tammy giggled. “You have been out of house every so often that you wouldn’t notice when she storms the bathroom every other morning. And honestly, I only noticed because that’s when I’m out in the garden, and her bathroom is above the peach trees, so I was bound to notice sooner or later. Besides…” She shrugged. “Lex, she’s already starting to show a bit, so it’s really a no brainer.” 

Lexie stood still, legs and hands shaking as she fought back the tears. She had been so proud of herself, managing full days now without crying, and here she was, bawling her eyes out over something that should have brought joy to her, but instead, only make her sadder than ever. 

And that was likely only beginning the scratch the feelings of her poor mum regarding the ordeal. To be left a widow was bad enough, really, but an expectant widow? This was fate, guffawing morbidly at their misfortune. 

Her mom’s last gift had therefore also been her parting one.


	7. Breaking Point

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written by my co-author, Mr. Dynasty. Originally a stand-alone point, but re-inserted into "Embers Ablaze" because it fit well into the theme and the timeline.

Flesh, was _chained_ to cruelty. That, Sabrina knew. It didn’t come as a surprise to her. In all things living, there was a portion of immutable, deafening sorrow, a sharp, vicious grain, no matter how small, that would always dig and rend its way through, no matter how heavily or how rapidly you tried to ensconce it in happiness. 

With all things, the thought brought Roxie into her mind, like a razor. She thought back ten, nearly twenty years, to a night that she could never dismiss. A night that had passed like a kidney stone. A night that had nearly broken the both of them, even though the pain, and the hurt, at least physically, had been Roxie’s to bear. She, like a concrete wall, had only served as the object to crash against, and bear it. 

“Get the fuck out of my face!” Roxie had seethed, her face filmed with sweat that smelled like a gas-pump. Her shoves meant nothing. Weak, and off center, she stumbled more than she did any real harm. Sabrina had only stood there, while the rocker deflected away. “You’re a stupid bitch any’ow! I dunno why you fink it’s your job to see me innis state I’m in! Can’t fuckin’ breathe, can’t fuckin’ think!” She stuttered. “I-I just need a pip, is all, and I’m good.” 

Roxie’s tone alternated in shifts, from pleading, to demanding, to condemning, but none made Sabrina more pliant. She was only now beginning to realize that. 

“I need you to relax, Roxie,” She’d said, eyes impassive. “You’re making this harder on yourself than it needs to be.” 

Roxie hugged herself. “I can’t. Y-you’re not understanding me! I ain’t gonna make it ‘frue this, wivout getting at least sumfing! You can’t just shut down a ‘abit like mine, cold! This is a solid twelve-year bit I’ve been on! My body needs this shit, to keep going! Don’t you get it!?” 

“We’ve been over this, Roxie. You just need to take the methadone.” 

“The methadone makes me sick!” 

“It makes you sick, because you take it with oxycodone.” 

All routes of reason and rhetoric, now exhausted, Roxie did the only thing she had left. She squatted down to her haunches and cried. Sabrina knew now, that she should have remained standing, that she should have remained emotionally detached, been cruel instead of kind, when it was needed. 

Maybe then, their life together wouldn’t have gotten off to such a rocky start in those first years. Maybe then, Roxie’s habit would have been on its way out the door that night, instead of re-emerging again and again over the course of the next year. Maybe then, she wouldn’t have any awful memories at all that she couldn’t forget of Roxie, and would now only have good ones to look back on. 

But even then, she’d loved that woman so damn much, that she just couldn’t stop herself. 

That had been the first moment that Sabrina’s compassion had overcome her reason. 

It had also been the last moment that Roxie’s anger had overcome hers. 

Sabrina sank down beside her, expecting to brace shoulders, and to reassure. Roxie, from all she could tell to this day, had been expecting to break her neck. 

In those first nights, she’d often found herself looking at Roxie’s eyes, which she’d found remarkably doleful, in spite of their brightness. Blue orbs, rimmed by deep purple of fatigue and heartsickness. Eyes that slowly, ever so slowly, had began to repair themselves, in her presence. Repairs she felt, reflected those in her own, of sanguine and gunsmoke, that had grown less sharp, and less murky in the meantime. 

Eyes that, when Roxie had looked up from her, that night, had vanished completely, to be replaced by a killers eyes. Eyes that were too much like hers, in shades of azure. Eyes that had been dredged up from long, long ago. 

She hadn’t expected to be struck so hard in the face. Roxie was not a powerful, or large human being, constructed of what might have, at a distance, been confused for dowel-rods, tightly wrapped in rubber bands till it looked like a makeshift person. But she knew where to slug a person to get them to scream in pain, which was exactly what she’d done. 

And she didn’t stop. Driven to irrational, savage brutality by her addiction, she came on hard, and came on fast, like a typhoon. None but the initial blow fell home, none but the first, but there had been many more forthcoming, Sabrina could tell. 

Which was why she’d ended it. Hard and fast, and without mercy. 

Roxie’s hands, which had been before, clawed and descending, flew to her neck. The snarl coming out of her mouth turned into a gag, and then breathless mewling. Instead of curling over and coming down upon the psychic, she was bending backward and collapsing. 

She’d nearly choked the life out of Roxie that night. Pushing her down to the floor and clamping her windpipe shut until she was blue. 

Sabrina had never been hit before. Ever. Certainly not in the face. She hadn’t expected it to make her so angry, but it had. She hadn’t even stopped when Roxie began to twitch and spit from between clamped teeth. She’d just, lost it. When she finally realized what she was doing, she’d had Roxie five feet off the ground, hanging limply in the corner against the ceiling, not moving, and no longer breathing. 

It was a wonder, and abbreviated miracle that Roxie had survived that night at all. As a gym leader, of course, she was required to know CPR, but even the emergency-room visit to follow had been an exercise in cruelty. She’d just torn that memory clean out of Roxie’s head, before anyone could ask her what had happened. 

The nurses had only tutted when Roxie told them she remembered getting very sweaty and uncomfortable, then losing consciousness. “That’s why you have to remember to take your methadone,” they chastised, leaving her dosage on a tin tray, and sharply avoiding any and all question of the enormous black eye Sabrina had been sporting. 

It had taken so long, just to overcome that thought, that she might’ve killed Roxie, before their love had truly begun. And still, that thought had arisen, on many a blue occasion. She’d never spoke of it, never reminded Roxie of what she’d done, never uttered a peep of it. She’d simply slept on it, over the years, until that rough grain of cruelty had formed a callus on her soul, and became easier to ignore. 

The life she’d eventually built for Roxie, and for herself, following that one cruel edit, had been, without overselling it, without aggrandizing it, without overhyping it in any way... 

The longest, happiest, most rewarding period of her life. She’d been given love like she’d never had cause to imagine, she’d been blessed with children unlike those of any other, and she’d been, even with her unrivaled power to take what she wanted, and achieve unequaled prestige, totally and utterly completed, entirely satisfied, and left with a daily desire for more, in spite of how mundane it might’ve seemed to any bystander. 

So then, looking back on it all now, she often found herself wondering these days-- 

Was it the bigger cruelty that Roxie had died, at the hands of a creature she herself had given shape and form to, robbing her of all that joy in an instant? 

Or was it the bigger cruelty that she had paid for all of that happiness, that joy and that fulfilment, top to bottom, her relationship, her kids, the whole thing--with a lie? 

Sabrina sat alone, in the back garden, from where you could see the ocean, and feel it’s breeze. The keynotes of a sad song drifted from the neighborhood tavern, and all the smells of salt and damp island air wafted with it. 

But she didn’t care about any of it. All she’d come out here to do was be alone. Alone with Roxie. She rested her back against the headstone, and just sighed. Her anguish went past crying now, just to the point where she simply wished she would stop thinking, stop moving, stop breathing, whenever the urge to weep arose. That feeling did arise, not much longer after, when she realized what the biggest cruelty of all, was. 

No matter how hard you tried to wrap them up in happiness and forget the sorrowful seeds within, they still lingered, and they still stuck you, when it seemed like you would forget. 

She rubbed her stomach, replete with child. This was the same. A little bundle of joy, but for her, a tiny pit of anguish lie within it. She set her teeth together and groaned, in absolute depression. A special day of love, too, held its own core of anguish, now, as well. 

“Well,” she voiced to the person six feet beneath her. “Happy anniversary.”


	8. Out Of Practice

**VIII “Out of Practice”**

The first thing Esteban did, before even passing the door sill, was to kiss both Lexie and her girlfriend on their cheeks, praising their house. “It’s amazing, girls! Huge, and still so tidy! But I guess you need the space with three little kids...and it’s even more admirable that you keep it so clean!” Esteban paused, giving the walls an assessment. “Could use more colors, though…” 

Lexie smiled warmly, while Lenny, who had been running up and down the stairs and scoffing at his sissy and auntie getting smoochies, took this as an invitation to pack his crayons and start decorating the walls, before Tammy managed to pick him up and carry him to the kitchen table, where he could safely act out his creativity on sheets of paper. 

“Thank you for coming on short notice, Esteban. I know it’s not all that easy, flying all the way from Blackthorn to Shamouti…” Lexie fiddled with her bolero jacket. She had been hesitant about calling Esteban, but Tammy had convinced her with the simple argument that after a whole year of living on fast food and canned soups, they were definitely up for some real meals. And her girlfriend’s garden was yielding masses of fruits that would otherwise go wasted. 

“Really, Lexie, it’s nothing. I am happy to see you again after so long, and I am happy to see you this content. It must have been a hard time, for all of you.” He glanced around, and Lexie was sure she knew who he was looking for. Esteban was psychic, he was one of the few who understood just how grave the situation had been, dealing with her mother’s Facet, and he was also one of the few acquaintances of the family who knew just how deep the Nidoran’s hole truly was. He had been Lexie’s only psychic confidant outside of her immediate family, and she felt something gnawing at her conscience at the reminder of the amount of time she had ignored him. 

“Besides…” He seemed to want to wave her last comment aside. “I didn’t fly in from Blackthorn. I dove straight in from Anistar.” 

“Anistar?!” Lexie gasped. “That’s halfway across the globe!” 

Esteban nodded. “It is. Olympia- the gym leader of the city, invited all of her former pupils to a sort of conference, and my father was among them, so I tagged along.” He paused, his shoulders rolling uncomfortably. “You met Olympia yet? She’s rumored to be one badass strong psychic, but I must admit, I found her to be more…well, creepy than astonishing.” He looked to his side. “If you ask me, she’s not fully human. I don’t know what she is…but certainly not made out of the same flash as you and me are!” He chuckled. “And all of these haikus, Arceus damnit it! That can get on your nerves easily!” 

Lexie smiled. “Either way, thank you, Esteban for visiting. It has indeed been a hard time…” She paused, a deep sigh lingering within her throat. “And it still is, in all honesty.” She glanced aside, noticing that Leslie had climbed down the stairs as well at the ruckus in front of the house, and was now fighting her brother for the best pencils. Thankfully, Tammy was there to break the brawl apart before the young psychics could come up with the idea of shooting the pencils at each other as makeshift arrows. Sometimes, it made Lexie wonder if she had been such a nuisance in her earliest years, and if her mom had reacted with the same calm amusement Tammy displayed whenever she was overwhelmed by a power she could neither gain nor never truly grasp. 

Esteban grabbed her shoulder hard, giving her a reassuring squeeze. “You have been doing well, Lexie. I am sure of that.” He smiled. “In fact, I was approached by some islanders when I arrived at the airport. I think they adore your singing, and would like to see you perform more often.” 

Lexie almost laughed, but it was buried fast under another wave of sighing. “Well, I’d like to, really, Esteban, but I cannot leave the house during the day, when the kids are all awake. I cannot leave them alone, or else I’ll find another house in ruins, courtesy of a psychic fight going out of control, after I return.” She smiled weakly. It still felt weird, if not outright wrong, to make jokes about the events of last year, especially with it being so close to the first anniversary of her mum’s death. On the other hand, it relieved her soul of a burden, of the fixture of having to mourn and grieve. One could only breath under a smoke-filled dome of lachrymose for so long before they asphyxiated, and she had long since started gasping for air. 

Esteban smiled warmly. “I see. I’ve heard there’s another mouth to feed, now?” 

Lexie sighed. That was putting it nicely. If it had been just a mouth with no other function than to be fed...instead it was a mouth that tended to scream if not attended to, and, of course, wherever an entrance was, so was an exit. “Yes, my youngest sister, Leonore…” She grinned, noticing that even from the kitchen, Lenny registered the mention of the newborn and rolled his eyes. But then, he hardly had to complain. He had actually expressed his wishes for another sister. Maybe because he was starting to grow into the role of the knight in shining armor that protected his innocent sisters at all costs. Astonishingly, it had been _Leslie_ who had wished for a brother, and was in the process of brushing her younger sister off consistently. Not that Lexie could complain about it, really. It was hard enough tending a newborn, she didn’t need her toddler siblings to try to be of assistance when they were more of nuisance. 

Esteban, bless his soul, noticed the shift in mood and coughed politely. “But I’m not here just for conversation, right? You actually came to me to ask for help, right?” 

She nodded. “Right, indeed. We’re...well, honestly neither me nor Tammy are the sharpest knife in the kitchen.” 

Her girlfriend, finally fed up with the toddlers and their quarrel over the bright purple glitter crayon, concurred. “I grew up with something that attempted to be a kitchen, but..” She shrugged. “You can’t expect much from junk culled from the dump, can you?” 

“Only that you turned it into a chemistry lab, Tammy.” 

The rocker almost winked at Lexie. “And the good deed it did us, no? I think Pierre even moved out two days after his house underwent a smelling cure.” Esteban clapped his hands. “No trouble, girls. As I say, everyone can cook, the only trouble we run into is to cook something edible.” 

Lexie found herself glancing at her little brother again. Surely, if he had his way, mud pies were absolutely safe to consume. 

The young man rubbed his hands. “Okay, you did say you have a garden? What kind of stuff do you grow there?” 

It was Tammy’s turn to explain now, seeing as she was the uncontested king of the yard. “Mostly fruits and all kinds of berries for the kids. Peaches, apples, blueberries, raspberries, huckleberries- but they don’t grow here very well, and, well, strawberries.” She smirked at Tammy. “Lots and lots of strawberries. They’re growing madly around here, really.” 

“Wonderful! That’s where we’ll start, absolutely! Bringing a little bit of sweetness back into your lives.” He winked. “I just know the right recipes for your plethora of strawberries.” 

Scene Change

Twenty minutes later, chaos ensued. But Lexie couldn’t find it in herself to complain. Not at all. It was, she mused silently as she cleaned and dripped the water off the berries, the kind of chaos she had looked forward to when she had first met her siblings. It was a kind of amusing mess, filled with laughter, squealing and fun, not with fear, anxiety and dread. It was the general mayhem life with two small kids caused, with all the joys and woes possible. 

Lenny was running between the backyard and the kitchen area, carrying a small basket filled with a rag and as much strawberries as he could safely manage and unloaded his haul next to the sink, where Esteban was washing the fruits and chit-chatting with the little boy, who clearly appreciated the male supervision. Leslie was outside with Tamara and aided her with harvesting the strawberries. Most of the time, though. Sometimes, the white-haired girl stormed the kitchen and asked impatiently how far they were, and Lexie had to calmly tell her that they had barely just started, and it would take at least another ten minutes before they could start making jam. Obviously, this answer did not satisfy little Leslie, and she pouted a bit, pushing herself up the bar chairs in the middle of the kitchen and putting her elbows on the table. “Can I cut them?” She asked suddenly, remembering more details of the recipe than Lexie had wanted to. 

“No, no, that’s what I’ll do, Leslie...but you can get the mint, if you want to.” Leslie nodded so fast Lexie barely had time to register it, before the girl was outside again on the back porch, where Tamara’s wide assortment of potted herbs and spices was stored. 

“She’s an eager little thing, isn’t she?” Esteban mused, before announcing to Lenny that they had enough strawberries for the moment. They’d later try out some more recipes, like strawberry waffles, a strawberry chutney and, most unusual, strawberry pudding. Lexie was still not sure if this kind of endeavor was safe to try out with complete cooking newbies as she and Tamara depicted themselves. 

“She is, she is. She reminds me a lot of mom. Borderline hyperactive, if you ask me.” Lexie laughed. Considering that Leslie seemed to have been hit by Roxie’s death harder than her older brother, even going as far as to refuse any contact with her remaining mother for a while, it was astonishing to see her this relaxed now. 

Esteban took a glance over her shoulder. Given his height, he hardly had to stretch at all. “Stir it really well...you should not see any bit or piece of the canning sugar any more.” 

It felt a bit as if she was rowing through glue, and Lexie would have told him as much, if she wasn’t putting much of her energy into moving the wooden ladle and didn’t have enough left to talk. “For how long?” 

“Until there are bubbles, then three more minutes. Don’t worry, we’ll keep a glance at the clock, won’t we, Lenny?” The black haired boy nodded eagerly, and immediately went to stare at the kitchen clock as if his stare could bring it to move faster. Knowing his powers, it was even a possibility, and for the sake of the jam, Esteban told himself to keep a glance at his wristwatch, too. “And your mother? Honestly, Lexie, I have not seen her all day...is she alright?” 

Lexie groaned, and she couldn’t even tell why. One part of her was definitely frustrated at the apparent weakness of her paper arms that couldn’t even deal with a pot full of guck, another part just didn’t want to be reminded of her mother. Not when she had just started to feel something akin to catharsis in her gut. “Good question, Esteban...she tends to lock herself in her room all day, and only gets out at night or very early in the morning, when she needs to feed herself or when Leonore is extraordinaryly fussy about something. And sometimes, I see her around mum’s grave, weeping and lamenting. You tell me, is that alright?” 

From the look on his face, Esteban was momentarily taken aback by the fact that the lithic column he had noticed from the living room window was de facto a grave and not some morbid decoration. He coughed, before he could gather himself. “No, I don’t think that sounds alright, not after...it has been a year now, has it?” 

Lexie nodded gravely. It was getting harder and harder to stir the pot, not only because her arm was getting sore, but also because her energy left her body through another canal, and that was the emotional drain. “It will be a year by tomorrow.” She glanced at her siblings, Lenny still monitoring the clock, Leslie stealing a strawberry from the basket that had been left unattended on the counter. “I try not to make much of a fuss of it, the little ones are not aware of the occasion, anyway, and..” She sighed deeply and Tamara had to take over the pot for a moment, for the psychic teenager just felt too weak suddenly to support herself anymore. “I don’t want to be reminded of it in any way, Esteban. I don’t want to commemorate it in any way, I don’t want to _remember_ it...honestly, I want tomorrow to be a normal day, a fu…” She stopped herself short, but she was sure that at least Leslie, who seemed to have a very sensitive ear for curse words, had understood what she had been aiming at, anyway. “A freaking normal day that starts at 5 am and ends sometime in the night with me singing away my pains for a few dollars and cheap drinks, really, Esteban, that’s all I expect from tomorrow, and if that’s all I get, I cannot be happier. I don’t want to think about this nightmare, and I don’t want to make it any more _special_ by doing anything out of the ordinary.” She looked up, meekly, and hid the tears beneath a stony mask. 

Esteban, his own eyes so much darker than hers, stared at her face for the longest time, before answering. “I am sorry, Lexie. I really did not want to bring this up. I should have known that you are still mourning. I apologize for my rudeness. Really. If you want to, you can take a break, I think me and the kids will manage just well.” 

The psychic girl shook her head rapidly. “No, no, I’ll be okay, really. I need the distraction, Esteban. I’ll just…” She sighed. “Give me a moment to look after Leonore, okay? She should be hungry by now, and I need to make sure that mum has not forgotten to feed her.” She gulped a bit and braced herself for the inevitable confrontation that was bound to happen if her mother hadn’t fulfilled her duties. As much as she was sure that her siblings had no concept of the amount of time that had passed by since their mum’s death, as certain was that her mother had _not_ misremembered, and approaching her now would be close to lethal. Still, it was her duty, as the only one who could still address her safely. “I’ll be back right away, okay?” Lexie forced a smile onto her face, for the sake of all the others present. “Don’t have a shot at the jam without me, understood?!” 

Esteban laughed, even if it was a forced laugh on his part, too. “Of course, Lexie. No one will dare to touch it before you’re back.” 

He should have known that this was not an order in Leslie’s ears, but rather a challenge. 

As soon as Lexie had left for the upstairs, Esteban sighed loudly and turned to Tamara, currently in charge of the jam and of the protection of the remaining stock of strawberries, which, for some weird reason, was depleting every time she turned her back to Leslie. “Are you two really alright?” He whispered, mindful of the younger kids. 

Unlike Lexie, Tamara saw no need in sugarcoating her words. “We’re both fucked, what else, Esteban? Her mother is not working anymore, and we were left pretty broke when we had to rebuy everything that was not here before, especially all the stuff that comes with the needs of two rapidly growing kids and a newborn.” She glanced at Leslie behind her. “And we can be happy that she’s not fussy about having to don the clothes of her brother. She seems to like them even, the little tomboy she is.” Tamara shrugged. She hadn’t been any different, and then there had been the fact that her own brother had been presented with her worn clothes, too. “So, in short, we’re both in damn trouble, money-wise, and that’s not accounting for the fact that we cannot even work regularly, with all the kids still so small and her mother being a shithead and refusing to do anything but the necessary. You’ve heard it, she does care about the baby, but poor Lexie has to monitor her, for there’s the slight chance she might forget her youngest child.” Tamara sighed. “We’re bumbling through, we really are, but don’t ask me how.” She smiled weakly. “Just don’t ask me how.” 

Esteban gave the little puppy that had now appeared to her feet a confused glance. “And this one here is…?” 

“Oh, the Lillipup? She’s mine, name’s Xena. I rescued her around nine months ago. Had to, for otherwise, no one would have believed me to be a trainer.” Tamara laughed. “She’s a good girl, if a bit too brave for her own good. I think she got lost in locked rooms way too often, with the to be expected results.” 

Esteban kneeled down, giving the puppy a scratch behind the ears. “I grew up with dogs as well. My mother bred them. Houndoom. We always had half a dozen of them running around...if you ever need help training the little lady here, feel free to ask. I may be able to give you some tips.” 

“I appreciate it, Esteban, and should I really be out of answers one day, I may contact you, but for the moment, she’s my personal responsibility, and I’ll try to train her the best I know.” 

Esteban sighed. “You sound as if you’re underworked with three kids…” 

Tamara only groaned jokingly. 

Scene Change

Lexie quietly walked up the stairs to the bedroom she now shared with Tamara, and opened the door. The alcove was occupied entirely by her littlest sister and her bed. She briefly wondered if her decision to take the baby in with her and Tammy had influenced her mother’s carelessness towards the youngest member of the family, but quickly shushed away these thoughts when she noticed that Leonore was fed, swaddled and as happy as a little baby could be. Sighing, she let herself fall into the armchair opposite of the crib and watched her sister sleep peacefully, her chest lifting and dropping with every breath she took. Leonore looked so much like her late mother, it was scary sometimes. The same blue eyes that also adorned Lexie herself, and white hair with a touch of dark green. And the freckles. Lexie smirked. She had been mildly amused back then when her mom had freaked out over the first of her kids finally inheriting her freckles, the person in question being Leslie. And now there was a second kid, and, damn it, Leonore looked even more like Roxie. 

Lexie sighed and let her head rest in her palms. Sometimes, she wondered if this had been the straw that finally broke her mother’s back. After all the pain she had been through, to be blessed with another child that looked just like her wife...it must have been devastating, to be reminded of her loss in a moment of otherwise blissful joy. 

Not that it was any reason to reject Leonore, really, Lexie reminded herself with a scowl. The girl had done nothing that entitled her to this treatment. She hadn’t been consulted in the question of existence. She just came to be. And all things considered, even that was a stroke of luck. 

Scene Change

“I think you’ll have enough jam now to last you a lifetime.” Esteban laughed as he was almost tackled by both Leslie and Lenny, both in a state of uncontrollable hyperactivity caused by sugar consumption. Lexie herself nibbled on a piece of strawberry waffles, sprinkled with powdered sugar and whipped cream. They were sitting outside under a canopy next to the pool. It was a strangely loosened atmosphere, despite the fact that Lexie couldn’t help but glance to her left every so often. Her mum’s grave was plainly visible from here, like the Beedril’s stinger sticking out of their freshly healed skin, and it felt weird for no one to comment on it, or even acknowledge it. She supposed in Esteban’s case, it was with intention, for he didn’t want to affront them, but she had to wonder why she herself and Tamra could sit here, relax and eat various desserts without falling into deep grief at any second. 

Taking a look upside at the annex on the opposite side of the pool, the dark cave that was her mother’s bedroom, she realized why. They were starting to recover. 

Scene Change

Esteban had long since gone to bed, spending the night on the couch on the first floor, when Lexie came home after another night of grinding her voice and body till she felt like she would collapse and spit blood. Tamara had gone to bed already, being tired after a whole day of standing up, first in the kitchen, than in the pub next door. The kids were also fast asleep, and Lexie, content with a quiet moment just for herself, went into the bar next to the kitchen and poured herself a drink. She supposed there was some irony to it that while her siblings had been busy stuffing themselves with strawberry pudding- which had turned out surprisingly tasteful, despite their best efforts to mess it up, she had quietly asked Esteban for cocktail recipes containing strawberries. And she supposed that it had been Esteban’s pity that contributed to the fact that he had quietly slipped her a small booklet with handwritten recipes. Giving the paper now the attention it deserved, she looked at what she had in stock, before settling on a strawberry daiquiri. 

Five minutes later, she shuffled back into the kitchenette, when the chime of the clock momentarily startled her. She stared first at the clock, then at the calendar beneath, and sighed. So this was it. The first anniversary of her mom’s death had dawned. 

She didn’t know where she was aiming as she walked on, before being startled a second time. At first, she had thought to be seeing a ghost, and it was hard to keep the goosebumps on her arms under control, before she realized that the figure standing behind the kitchen table was her mother. 

Not saying a single word, she stood there, staring out of the window, with a plate of the waffles in her left hand. Lexie didn’t address her, for she knew what she was staring at. One had a perfect view on her mum’s tombstone from there, after all.


	9. Out of Your Mind

**IX “Out of your Mind”**

Lexie wondered if there was a kind of threshold of death news you could take before you finally crumbled into a helpless bundle of misery. If there was, then, the obvious next question was if this limit was universal, or if it was different for every individual. And of course, consequently, she asked herself if her own frontier had been cracked. After all, her mum had been the first person she’d known to die, and one could hardly claim to have reached their deadline after one measly death, no matter how gruesome, she thought with an irritated snarl. 

She also wondered if the death of someone she hadn’t met in several years effectively counted, after all. All things considered, she hadn’t had the closest relationship with her grandfather. They had been on good speaking terms, and really, she had loved him for what he was, which was a good story-teller and source of advice when it came to more mundane things neither of her wacky mothers really could grasp, and, of course, she had always felt how close he was to his own, only child. She supposed the backstory of his wife, her grandmother, dying when Roxie was still very young, leaving him a young widower, had left its marks on him as well. In a way, it was a cruel mirror image of what had happened to her mum, and still the two of them had never been able to connect in a way that might have even remotely been called a healthy father-in-law/daughter-in-law relationship. In fact, she had taken notice of the iciness between them that was, while unlike the one between her mom and Sabrina’s mother, still there and had only intensified over the years. She did not know the terms under which it had sprung to life, it had never mattered much to her as long as she got along well enough with her grandfather, but in the face of recent events, it seemed actually important. 

Seeing as how her mother refused nowadays to get out of her room unless it was a true emergency- or she was starving, which was, in her eyes, not as much of an emergency as some neighbour’s kids making fun of the grave in their backyard, it was Lexie herself who answered the phone. She did not recognize the voice at the other end, but with it having an accent she hadn’t heard in a long time, she knew where the call originated from. And that alone gave her clue enough of the reason for it. 

Tamara had been busy training with Xena when Lexie walked out into the back porch, phone still in hand, slightly paralyzed. The blond guitarist immediately noticed that something was up with her girlfriend, and ordered Xena to stay where she was. 

“Lexie…?” 

She looked up. “Just got a call. Pop died.” She sighed, sitting down on the stairs next to the pool, where her brother was doing laps. “As his grandchild and only descendant of age, I inherit everything that he’s left. It’s doesn’t amount to much, but…” She wringed her fingers, before finding herself sobbing all of the sudden, and burying herself in her partner’s chest. She was glad that Lenny was way too busy with breaking his personal record to see her sobbing. 

“Sh, it’s okay, Lexie, it’s okay…” Tammy rubbed her back, keeping an eye on Lenny as well, who had taken it upon himself to be taken under her wing. The boy loved his physical activity. All the better to have a release this easy and legal to pursue, she mused. “He was a good man, what little I have seen of him. And he lived a full and happy life.” 

Lexie snickered helplessly, aided by her vast resource of black humor. “Only that he had to bury his own child. Parents should not have to bury their own kids, Tammy. That is just not fair. That’s not how life is supposed to be.” She sighed. “And I haven’t seen him in so long..” With him being retired, there hadn’t even been the chance of him accidentally visiting the islands while on duty. She rubbed her forehead, still finding her hands to be clammy and the coldness lingering in her fingertips. “He left me all of his belongings, as well as his farm in Almia. Have to talk to mother, I’m afraid, I have no idea how to deal with all of that stuff right now. I suppose we can sell much of it...especially the property…”The sound that escaped her throat almost dared to turn into a groan. “It’s of no use for me, but I can’t help but feel wrong saying this, Tammy. It’s still part of my family.” All too often, especially in recent years, she forgot that she was only half Saffron. The other half of her came, in truth, from Almia, just like her mum had never denied, and even expressed pride at originating at the back country. Lexie had never found it in her to identify with Almia at all, but inheriting her grandfather’s farm suddenly made that fact crash into her face with the intensity a truck would have. 

Tammy smiled. “That’s understandable, Lexie. It’s all too understandable.” For a brief moment, the blonde’s gaze turned to her left, and Lexie understood the hidden meaning behind. “But as painful as it sounds, it’s in the past. It’s a closed chapter, and it wouldn’t do you any good to mourn a history you never had. And maybe your grandfather even knew that. He did pass everything to you, after all? So he trusted you with it. And I trust you that you’ll choose wisely. Arceus knows we could still use the money.” 

Lexie nodded. It felt cruel, to be speaking about a lifetimes of memories in mere monetary values, but it was the honest truth that the house in Almia was nothing but a distant figment for her, composed of nothing but disdainful facts. And with both her mother and her grandparents dead, all individuals able to tell her the stories that might have filled the property with life were gone, so it did not seem as her decision to sell it- one she had unconsciously already made, anyways, would matter. 

Scene Change

Lexie could not tell what had felt weirder, in the end- walking in silence through her grandfather’s house, checking through his belongings for something that might be of value for them, either in simplicity, utility, prize or emotion, or the fact that her mother had tagged along. She was like the ever present shadow, looming behind her or Tammy no matter where they went. Lexie, honestly, was trying to avoid her, for this felt like an invasion of something her mother had no right to take any participation in. This was the final end of the chapter, the epilogue of her connection with her mom’s side of her family, and for all that it was worth her, her mum’s marriage to Roxie didn’t count a shit in this case. She was even more distanced from this part of the family than Lexie was, and unlike Lexie, who was at least willing to play-pretend the loving granddaughter not only for the public’s, but also for her own sake, her mother didn’t even try to hide her disdain. It was, in a way, understandable, Lexie supposed. Sabrina was again and again reminded of the big, missing spot in her life, and in a way that was connected with death again. 

In the end, the few objects they had taken with them seemed pitiful in comparison to the whole house, but then, her grandfather didn’t have a wide assortment of belongings anyways, being the travelling type and changing addresses several times over the years. She had made sure to take every and any photo with her that she could get her hands on, not caring if the people on them were strangers to her. She would have to sort through the boxes and albums later. In secret, she was hoping to finally find a photo of her grandmother, a person that had, so far, stayed pretty shrouded in mystery aside from the upsetting story her mom had told her mum many years ago, when it had become clear that thoughts were no equivalent for hard-spoken words. 

While she had been on the hunt for any kind of photogenic evidence of her family’s existence, Tammy had been walking around the house, mostly without aim. She had been the one who had, by all accounts accidently, found Roxie’s room, or what the two of them suspected to be her room. There were, after all, the tell-tale posters of rock-bands long since forgotten, broken up or plain dead, and the little details, like the acid blue hair tie, the magazine snippets about poison Pokemon and, Lexie felt amused to find, a lone, hidden bottle of non-name beer that had, by some miracle of Arceus himself above, been left untouched for more than forty years now. For that achievement alone, it belonged into a museum, nevermind that it was her mother who had left it behind. 

It was also there, being draped over the dusty bed sheets, that Tammy found an old instrument, one Lexie had assumed to not even exist anymore. 

“Hey, Lex! Take a look at this!” Tammy called from above the stairs, leaning forward. 

“You think it’s hers?” She asked not much later, when Lexie was examining the guitar, carefully turning it around in her hands. 

“No doubt about that, Tammy. No one else could violate an instrument like this…” She mumbled, registering the many many places it had have to been repaired. “Besides...I think I’ve seen her with it on pictures...this has to be her bass guitar. I wonder why her dad kept it…” Slowly, Lexie sat the instrument back onto the bedsheet, shrugging. “I cannot imagine her ever leaving it behind willingly. That would be like, pardon me, leaving one of her kids behind.” And while he had left those behind, Lexie thought with an irritated, sarcastic inward snarl, it had been because of her death, not because she had been fed up with them. 

Tammy, who had sat down on the squashy mattress and, as a consequence, almost disappeared as she was swallowed by pillows and blankets, hesitated to pluck at the strings. “Do you want to keep it?” 

Lexie opened her mouth, but didn’t know what to say. She looked between the guitar and her girlfriend, and found herself wringing her hands again. It felt wrong to take it away, to rip it out of the scenery it had been meant to be for, but at the same time, leaving it behind for someone who didn’t know the emotional value of the instrument, who would either sell it like any other cheap commodity or, even worse, cram it into the trash bin without remorse, that felt even worse. She gulped. Would it really hurt to take the guitar with her? She supposed not. There was only narrow space on the plane, so the amount of items she could take with her was limited from the beginning, no matter how much she could redirect via postal service. Taking another deep sigh, she shrugged. “I guess it cannot hurt to carry it along, can it?” 

Tammy smiled, and, to Lexie’s surprise, took it upon herself to carry the guitar back to the hostel with her. 

Scene Change

When it felt as everything was over, when she thought even this murky chapter of her life was over, and she could switch back to her everyday modus operandi again, that was when the issues only really began. She supposed a part of her should have been ready for it. There was only so much pain a human could take, only so many reminder of a life lost they could have placed all around them before they snapped, and her mum, she should really have known by now, was no different at all. In fact, her fuse was even shorter, and the past years had only worsened the condition. They might have made her even more irritable, but Lexie wasn’t one to tell, given that the few talks she had had with her mother hadn’t amounted to much of a chance at a psychological study at all. She had grown used to the silence, given that the noise emitted by her siblings more than compensated for it. There were many times when she had wished for advice, for help, or even for just a single reassuring word, a sign that she was doing her job well, that her mother honored the hard work she put into keeping the family together, and in raising her siblings as sane, respectful persons. Lexie often felt that the roof was caving in on her, and it was not a feeling brought to her by several nightmares that haunted her ever since that night in July, that night she had, she knew now, foreseen her mom’s death. If not for Tammy, Lexie was sure she would have collapsed long ago, and even with Tammy, she still felt shaky on her legs sometimes. It was not a question of her hanging on anymore. It had never been a question of her preserving what strength she had left for herself. It had always been finding reasons to carry on, and these reasons had been plenty, delightful and cherished by her, so as arduous as times could be, she kept her chin up. 

So when she got back home from work only a few weeks after returning from Almia, and could already smell the smoke from the front porch, she fought the dread creeping up her back and instead instantly went inside, to look for the source. 

She found her mother standing on the back porch, right behind the glass doors, a metal bin in front of her, and something smoldering within her hands. Lexie thought, foolishly, at first, that her mother was burning the old newspapers, a task, while not entirely unappreciated, still quite unnecessary, as Lexie usually took it upon herself to recycle the papers. Only when she got closer did she notice that the pieces of paper were way too small to belong to any paper, and they were way too familiar to her. 

She found herself shrieking, and shouldered her mother out of the way, to preserve what was left of the hundreds of pictures she had salvaged from her grandfather’s house. Judging from the height of the layer of ash within the bin, the majority of them was already lost forever. 

“What the hell did you do?” Lexie screamed, dusting off the remains of crusty, brown shells of paper from the picture she was now holding. It was one of the many that depicted her mom and grandfather, and she fought back the tears, seeing it reduced to half its size and besmirched by big, black spots. 

The look her mother gave her was not icy. Hell, Lexie was sure she would have been able to stand it if it had just been that usual, cold, pain-filled glare of discontent. She could stand that. She had been forced to stand it many times. 

But instead, what she received was a look that spoke of burning, angry, aggressive pain. One that spoke of actions taken, of the intention to hurt, with all the means in her arsenal possible. 

“I never wanted to have to do anything with this family again.” She hissed, words spit out like lava out of a volcano. “There is nothing that connects us anymore. I want nothing but to be left alone of all that ever reminds me of this family.” 

Lexie braced herself for an impact that never happened, so instead, she tightened her grip on the photo she was holding, and spit right back at her mum. “Maybe that’s the case for _you_ , but I am very proud of my heritage! Both of them! I am proud to be part of your family, _and_ of mom’s! And these pictures were meant for me, grandfather passed them on to me, not _you_ , mum.” She glared back. “You just destroyed my property!” 

She thought she would receive a sneer, but if anything, her mother’s breathing just quickened. “It belongs to me as much as it belongs to you, “ she retorted, eyes cast downwards towards the pictures that were left. Lexie noticed and quickly stepped forwards protectively. “Just as much as everything within these walls does.” 

“Oh, please…” Lexie still found it within herself to roll her eyes. “You lost the right to call anything here your own when you decided to become a hermit, mother. When was the last time you actually paid for anything, really? When was the last time I actually saw you doing something worthwhile in the house, really? Enlighten me, for I seem to have forgotten that you exist, momentarily.” 

“Watch your words, Lexie.” Her mother, Lexie knew, was in the possession of several kinds of anger. Hot and icy cold were only two nuances of many. Poisonous was the one she was using right now, and it was one of the more dangerous ones, for this was the kind of anger that could kill, slowly, but reliably, like the bite of an Arbok. 

“I will watch my words, mother, when you start acting in a way that deserves my respect again.” 

For a moment, it seemed as if her mother would lunge at her, but instead, she turned around and walked into the kitchen, abandoning the argument altogether. Lexie was taken aback, but unwilling to let the discussion stop this way. It had been so long since she had been able to talk to her mother, and, even if they were hissing and spitting at each other right now, it was better than no talking at all, Lexie reminded herself. 

“What are you doing now?” She called after her mother. 

Sabrina, unfortunately for herself and everyone else involved, decided to answer in a brutally honest way. “Ending what I have begun, and destroy the last thing in this house that can remind me of her.” 

Lexie was so shocked by the words that she momentarily believed her mother to be turning into a murderer- she had seen her kill, and even if it had been a demon to be burned down by these hands, it was only proof of the fact that her mother could and would kill when provoked, and it made her steps all the more urgent as she followed her mother upstairs. Only when her mother reached her own room did she feel relief, for her siblings were gathered in Leslie’s room, likely scribbling all over coloring books right now. 

She did realize, then, what her mother was aiming at, and she found herself suddenly in front of her, not even remembering how she had bypassed Sabrina. “You are not going to destroy mom’s guitar, either.” She hissed, using all of her non-remarkable height to block her mother. 

“And you think you can stop me?” She asked daringly. 

“Yes.” Lexie felt no need to back up her statement in any way. Rationally, she did not have any argument other than to prove her sheer willingness to stop her mother, but whatever that could result in, she couldn’t even fathom right now. She had no intention of hurting her mother, ever, but if she was pressed for actions, she would have to resort to maneuvers she thought she would have never believed to be reasonably happening, nor did she regard them to be sane in any way. But her mother was right now proving to be out of her mind, anyway. 

She glared down at her daughter, eyes spitting icicles. “He was a fool, that father of hers. She had destroyed the guitar herself, and never wanted to be reminded of its existence anymore. And he had the guts to not only repair it, but to ask for my permission to let it be buried with her.” It was difficult to understand the last words, as Sabrina was rather growling them than properly speaking. 

Lexie froze. “Grandpa wanted to...bury her guitar with her?” She had hoped her eyes not to water at this thought. Hell, every time she looked at the guitar itself, she had to fight back the urge to bawl, knowing that this was something had mother had touched with her bare hands. That her fingerprints, her sweat was all over the material and strings, and it was all that remained of her way of playing in this world. Of course, there were still the records and the videos of her, but nothing was as tangible as the instrument Roxie herself had been performed on with her own hands ever since she had entered puberty. It wasn’t just an instrument. It was a relict. A memory. So much more. 

“Yes.” 

“And you refused him this wish…” Lexie fought with her voice, for there was nearly no spit left in her mouth. She felt cold all over. “You refused grandpa this last wish.” She shook her head. “Why?” 

Sabrina answered, and it sounded like the confessional of a guiltless. “Because his daughter was dead, and therefore, all was said and done. There was no need to charge me with even more needless wishes.” 

Lexie stared at the ground, not quite believing what she had just heard. She had known her mother to be saddened on a level that was almost inhuman, of course. But for her to become so abrasive...the girl almost choked before she realized that she was crying again. 

She sniffed. “Then I’ll do it.” 

Her mother seemed momentarily taken aback. “What?” 

“Then I’ll burn it and scatter the ashes over her grave. That is what he wanted, right? And it does not matter to you anymore, since it’s my doing, right? You won’t be bothered to participate in it at all, mother.” Lexie hissed. 

Sabrina growled back. “I won’t let you touch her grave!” 

“And with what right will you prevent me from, huh? I am also her child, in case you forgot. Unless, of course, you lied to me about my identity all through my life, mother.” She spit back, knowing that this insinuation would not only hurt herself, but also her mum deeply. 

“You just said it yourself. I am still your mother. I still have a right to say what you will do and what you will not do!” 

“Oh, right! Believe me, you just gambled away that right in the past three years. When was the last time you did something even remotely maternal, huh? Remind me please, for all my siblings have had of a mother for the last years was me and Tammy. Where were you when Lenny broke his arm and had to be rushed to the ER? Even Tammy stole herself away from the Corps for a day when she heard about it. Where were you when Leslie got in trouble for stealing chocolate? I hated scolding her, but that’s what a parental figure has to do, right? Where were you when Leo suffered through her first teeth? I didn’t get any sleep for five days straight, pretty sure you were fast asleep. Where were you when Lenny learned how to climb coconut trees- I was there, and had I not seen it with my own eyes, I still would not believe it…, and where were you when Leslie colored the whole front porch? Her pictures have still not been washed away. Have you listened to Leo’s first word? It was my name- or at least a try at it, mother.” 

Lexie stared at the floor. 

It took her mother a long time to answer, and when she did open her mouth again, it was no confession, but more spiteful accusations. “You think I’m all out of this world, don’t you? You think I do not participate at all in what goes on in this household, that’s what you think right?” She paused. “You are so wrong, Lexie. I know exactly what is going on here, and don’t think you can hide things from me, either. No one can hide their dark secrets from me, not even you.” She straightened up, and this time, Lexie was sure to see a sneer on her mother’s face. “Not that you’re hiding it very well, Lexie. I have been with your mom long enough to see the signs. The signs when you lose control, over your addiction. When it’s not just a relief anymore. Or a way to calm down. When it becomes a need. When it becomes necessary to drink to function. When you cannot stop it anymore. I have seen the signs, and I felt dismayed to see them mirrored in you. I had thought you were stronger than that. “ 

Lexie tried to hide the blood rushing to her cheeks, but to no avail. It hurt, it _stung_ , but she supposed that her mother was right. She realized she was sobbing when her next words came out blurry. “Well, can you blame me? Can you, in all honesty, blame me for it? I was seventeen, mother. I was only a teenager, and suddenly, my world crumbled. Everything that had been before was not anymore, and everything that was now was new and incomprehensible. I felt so alone, so helpless, and you left me with all the responsibility. You were never there for me, anymore. I admit, I never needed much of your help before, right, that’s true...but this day, these days and weeks...I _needed_ your help, and you were just not there!” 

The stare she received was unmoving and uncaring. “I was there. And I was doing what I could do best to ensure that life went on, Lexie. I admit that I might not have given you the support you deserved, but I thought you not to _need_ it. I expected more from my own child. I trusted you with your siblings. I knew you to give them what I could not, back then, and not right now, either. I knew that leaving them in your care would be better for them, and for me.” For a split moment, it seemed as if her mother wanted to confess something else to her, but if anything, she choked silently on her own words, not daring to utter them. “I didn’t trust myself to care for them, but I trusted _you_ , Lexie. I do not want to see you ending up like your mom! I do not want to see you succumbing to the same demons she almost lost her life to!” 

Lexie snorted back. “And do you know what saved her? Do you remember what saved her, in the end? You did, mother! You saved her! She was alive because of you!” 

“AND I KILLED HER!” Her mother roared back. It seemed as if she had spent all of her backed up emotional pain by cramming it into these four words, for she looked close to collapsing afterwards. “ She is dead because of me. That’s what good I have done to her, in the end. I saved her, only to murder her in the end. Is that what you want me to do to you and your siblings as well, Lexie? Do you really want me to destroy you as well?” 

Lexie shook her head violently. “You’re out of your mind if you think you’ll ever do that. You wouldn’t. You couldn’t do that.” 

It was hard to tell if her mother was really verbally defeated now. She certainly looked like it, but Lexie had long since realized that more often than not, her mother rose just when she seemed to be beaten. It was what had made the difference in the fight against Sabotage, after all. “Then what do you want me to do?” She asked, voice barely above a whisper. 

Lexie sighed. “I want you to be our mother. Nothing more, nothing less. Arceus knows we still need it. We still need you.” She sighed, and her eyes fell upon her mom’s guitar, innocently leaning against Leo’s empty crib. “And if you excuse me, I’ll need to bury that guitar now.” 

And just like Lexie had expected- or feared, if she had to be honest with herself, this was where her mother sprang back to life, and in a bad way. “NO!” She growled, and before Lexie had time to react, she felt her wrist engulfed by her mother’s cold hands. She tried to free herself, but to no avail. Her own patience long since having reached its limits, she snarled and found herself pushing her mother away psychically. It was astonishingly easier than she had expected it to be, but then, she had never truly tested her own powers against those of her mothers. The only comparable opponent she had ever had was Sabotage, and that had been an unfair fight from the beginning, on many levels. 

Her mother was certainly enraged by the defense she was met with, and the next thing Lexie knew was a picture frame soaring past her head. She was fast enough to dodge it, and so, it only split against the far-away wall. 

Pressed for attacking herself, she resorted to plain energetic assaults, unwilling to damage any furniture. Her aim might not have been the best, but she knew how to put power behind an attack, certainly, and in the confined space they were, missing was almost impossible. Her mother had to utilize defensive shielding, did she not want to have her face sliced open. Instead, the psychic spears Lexie had created clipped the wooden door behind her, sending splinters over the floor. 

For a short moment, it seemed as if her mother had transformed. From the human being to a savage animal, unable of possessing basal features such as empathy. Her eyes glowing deep bloody red, she reached out with her left hand. Immediately, Lexie felt her throat constrict, and she gasped for air, finding it unable to pass through her into her lungs. She almost let panic overcome her rational senses, before she fell back onto her powers, and cracked open the invisible choker her mother had placed upon her. She fell to the ground with an agonized wheeze, rubbing the skin that had not been touched by anything but supernatural energy. 

Looking up, she saw her mother in a state of shock, hand still extended, but eyes so widened it seemed only the white was prevalent anymore. For a split moment, she shivered all over her body, before anger overtook every bit of sanity anymore, and her hand was engulfed in fire. Lexie recognized the attack from the battle with Sabotage, and being past the point of lucid arguing herself, she copied the attack, and lunged forward. 

Neither of them noticed the door being opened. 

“ARE YOU TWO OUT OF YOUR MIND?!?!” 

Lexie did not have enough time to register what was happening before she heard a dull bash and something round and heavy hit her over the head with a ‘clung’, and she was slung to the floor. She held her head, seeing stars and darkness in turn, and only slowly registered that her mother had slumped against the wall as well, a tiny streak of blood running down her shoulder. Only then did Lexie notice that the back of her head was wet as well, and she detected the blood as well as the pounding that was beginning the torment her mind. “Oooww…” She groaned, trying to focus her eyes on anything, especially on the newcomer. “Tammy, are you crazy?” 

“I could ask you the same question!” The guitarist uttered, terracotta vase still in hand and, magically, undamaged despite having hit two pigheads. “What the hell were you thinking, screaming like that? I could hear you all over the house! And then I come in to check on you, and what do I have to see? You two trying to smelt through each other’s neck! Lexie, I ask you, are _you_ crazy?!” 

“No…” Despite the beginning headache, she still found it within herself to snark. “We were just arguing.” 

Tammy puffed her chest. “That, I heard, obviously.” She took a breath. “Down. Kitchen table. No questions asked.” Tammy glanced back one last time, sternness carved into every feature “RIGHT. NOW.” 

Lexie blinked. It was truly a marvelous thing to see her mother obeying a non-psychic that was not her mom, and it was, in turn, just as weird for herself to follow Tammy’s orders as well without protest. 

Having arrived at the kitchen table, Tamara made it clear that there was not to be any disagreement with her rulership for the time being. “Sit.” Lexie almost stumbled over her own feet trying to avoid choosing the same chair as her mother, who still didn’t seem to have noticed that the whole of her back was adorned by bloody patches now. Though, that didn’t matter much, Lexie mused. She didn’t want to know how her dress looked like from behind, either. 

Tammy glanced upwards at the end of the stairs, where three figures were hunched next and over and under each other. After a short moment of considering sending the kids back to their respective rooms, she decided that it wouldn’t matter, and that they had as much right to hear this as their mother and oldest sister respectively did. 

“Now, I do not need you to repeat anything of what was said these past hours. I heard enough.” She glared at the two psychics seated in front of her. “And don’t think you can pull any dirty trick on me. Yes, you both are psychics. Yes, you both are pretty damn powerful, I am aware of that, I’m no doofus, thank you both very much.” Tammy snarled. “And I have experienced the extent of your powers myself, indeed. I know what you are capable of.” At these words, she glared at Sabrina, who almost glanced downwards. “But, remember, I don’t give a shit. That’s it, I’ve said it. I am not afraid of you. Of neither of you. Despite knowing that you can break my neck with a snip of your finger, or confine me to a lifetime of nightmares with a simple blink. Been there, done that, you could say.” She paused again. “But I am not afraid of either of you. I am not afraid of ever being killed by either of you. Because I trust you not to kill me. I trust you, Lexie, not to kill me, because I know you love me. I trust you, MIss Winter, not to kill me, because I know that, deep inside, you care for your daughter, and you would do nothing that would outright _hurt her_ , despite…” Tammy rubbed her eyes tiredly. “Despite current evidence obviously speaking against you. And so, I trust both of you to let me speak my fucking mind freely. And quite frankly...I am right now so _pissed_ by with your behaviour that I can hardly keep myself from spitting in your faces. I know we’re in a shit-tight situation. I know not everything is going well. In fact, a lot of things are fucked up right now. I know we all have our problems, and I know that both of you are still mourning.” She glared first at Sabrina. “I know you to be grieving especially hard. I do not need to be a freaking mind reader to see this, obviously. I know you’ve lost your wife, the only person who ever seems to have a basic understanding of how your messed up brain works. I know how much this hurts you, and I seem to be right in assuming that you partly blame yourself for her death, maybe, after all, even with reason.” 

Tammy rubbed her forehead, and in this short break, Lexie took a glance at her mother to find her pale as snow and staring at the surface of the table, frozen in shock. 

“Your feelings are legit. There’s nothing minor or dismissable. I may not have the best understanding of the world as you see it, but I do understand that these powers are dangerous, and wielding them is a difficult profession. You are right when you think that you need to be wary of them, even yourself. But…” She pointed straight at Sabrina. “It’s absolutely no reason to abandon your kids. Think you’re protecting them? Fuck no. All you’re doing is depriving them of a mother they _need_ ….that’s your responsibility, in case you forget after giving birth to them. And despite your insistence, I _know_ you will not hurt them, and I hope to be right in assuming that Lexie agrees with me. If you ask me how I should know that, well…” Tammy sighed. “I am speaking to you here right now, and by Arceus, I am using harsh words, and I know there to have been a time when I would have been imaginarily strangled for my incivility. But since I am still able to breath free and unhindered, either I am using words not brash enough, or you have yourself well enough under control to keep yourself from slaying me.” She sighed. “And despite your greatest efforts, you did not kill your daughter right now. She is still sitting with us here, bustling, maybe with a little concussion thanks to these dirty hands of mine, but she is alive and kicking. So if you’re really that monster you think yourself to be, why are we still up and running?” 

She turned to Lexie, and even the psychic girl, who had known the rocker for many years and felt so intensely devoted to her, shivered under the cold stare of her grey eyes. 

“Lexie, you are the finest, nicest girl I’ve known all my life, and I love you with all of my heart. I would always support you and I’ve been with you through quite the adventure. Therefore, I cannot express how much it freaking _shocked_ me to see you attacking your mother. I’ve known you to be peaceful, and frankly, if someone else had told me you to have been this violent, I would have laughed straight in their face. But you yourself have to come and give me proof that you actually can be as reckless as your mother accuses you of being.”Tammy shook her head. “I’ve known you to drink a little bit too much recently, that much is true. And I know- or I think I know why this is, as well. You are still hurting just as much as your mother is. You are a nice fellow, an empathic fellow, and you try to hide your scars behind these layers of joy and gentleness, but, Lexie...beneath all of that, you are pained, and stressed, by this responsibility you simply cannot carry all on your own. And that’s okay, no one should be forced to bear all of that alone. Lexie, you cannot lie to me. You psychics may be able to lie to everyone, but never to the person that truly loves you. I can only assume the same was true for Roxie, hence why she was, with all her flaws, in the end the best thing to ever befall you...but…” Tammy sighed. “That, all of that, does not change the fact that she’s gone. Your drinking, your distancing, none of that will change anything about her absence. All it will do is tear this family apart for real and forever. And I want to ask you honestly, is that what you think Roxie would have wanted? Her wife to forsake their kids, her daughter to take up the addictions she herself had fought so hard to overcome? Do you really want to spit on her legacy by scratching each other’s eyes out?” 

The silence that followed was enough of an answer in Tamara’s eyes. She sighed. “See? Both of you want, in the end, only the same- you want this family to stay together and make it through this hard time. So damned will I be, if you don’t manage to work together and finish what you’ve started, and I don’t meant mauling each other, understood?” She glared at both of them in turn. 

Lexie then, decided to speak her mind. She wasn’t sure if it was one of the greater mistakes she had made this day, like daring to attack her mother, or placing that vase next to her bedroom. “What would you know about losing a parent, though...both of yours are still alive.” In retrospect, her words might have been a bit harsher than she had intended them to be, and really, she wouldn’t have begrudged Tammy if she had clobber her with the coffee machine next, but to her surprise, her girlfriend actually answered. 

“Oh, yes, that much is true. Both of my parents are still alive. But I still know how it is like to have one parental figure missing from your life, Lexie. Not in the most traditional way, of course, but…” She sighed, letting herself crash into the wooden chair again after having stood up just shortly before. “I know what it is like to be abandoned.” 

Just when it seemed as if she would fall silent, the blonde let out a soft groan and stared straight ahead, not focusing on either of them. “After I was born, I was placed in my father’s custody. I figured my mother was either too drunk or too drugged up or both to take care of me, who knows. I spend the first...ten, eleven? Years of my life with him, and his various girlfriends. Or rather, his nightly _acquaintances_ and his girlfriend. There was only ever one woman that endured him for longer than a week, and I tell you, she deserves an award for that stunt alone, never mind what she lived through.” It seemed as if Tamara had lost all sense of direction and time, as she was staring at the ceiling with her fingers waving around the table surface. “My father himself? Well, I was lucky if I saw him every Christmas or so...or, no, wait, this might give you a wrong impression. He _was_ there, but at the same time, he _wasn’t_?” Lexie shivered at the giggle that followed, because it sounded so unlike the Tamara she knew. More beaten, defeated, hopeless. “He was more like a ghost in his own home, doing his own thing, all day long. He never outright forgot about me, all right. He called for pizza service when I was hungry, he brought my clothes to the laundromat when they were dirty, and when I needed something for school or something broke, I wrote him a note and most of the time, things were taken care of the next morning. Sometimes, I found a banknote next to my scribbles, telling me to get whatever I needed. When I got older, I sometimes was allowed to buy my own food, and cook it. Bloody well it did me, if you couldn’t tell, still can’t even boil spaghetti right.” 

Lexie wanted to laugh, because she remembered Tamara being overstrained with the task of making noodles for lunch for the older kids, but that emotion was swiftly stiffened. 

“I was okay, you see? I was fed, I was healthy, I was good in school...hell, dad even paid for my guitar lessons, otherwise, I would never be the prof I am now, right? But that’s only one side of the coin…” She almost choked on her words. “The other side was that...when he was at home...and worse, when _his girlfriend_ was at home...he was a totally different guy. He’s very laid-back, if you haven’t gotten the message yet. There’s rarely anything that can get him to act, really. I don’t know if it’s the drugs, or if that’s simply how he is, but...he just fails at caring for anything. His own life, his house, his finances, his daughter...you name it. He _just never cared_.” She took a deep breath. “And that was fine, you know. That was okay. The only thing, the only golden rule, though, was to never object. Never disagree. Never speak out loud against him. Never. I had learned, no, _internalized_ that one quickly. Well, _I_ had. This girlfriend…” She shrugged. “I don’t know. Either this chick was too _stupid_ to realize it, or, well, she never _wanted_ to realize it. Either way, she made the mistake of answering him back. When he wants you to say ‘yes’, you are supposed to say ‘yes’, you know? What did she say? No. She refused. She resisted. She struggled. So he broke her…” 

Lexie felt as if she hadn’t moved in minutes, before Tammy’s story abruptly ceased at this point. She still felt the need to inquire. “He raped her?” She whispered, well aware of her younger siblings listening in on them. 

Tammy only shrugged. “Well, if your definition of rape is forcing yourself onto your partner while she’s screaming bloody murder and frantically trying to scratch your eyebrows off, then yes, he raped her.” Tammy smirked, her eyes half closed, with a predaceous look. “In front of his own daughter.” 

Lexie hadn’t noticed herself to be gulping, but when she came back to her senses, she found her throat to be absolutely dry. She glanced at her side, wondering if her mother had known about this, but found her to be unmoved in an alarming way. She herself certainly hadn’t, as she had refrained from reading her girlfriend’s thoughts. Now, she knew why. 

Tammy stood up, having herself emotionally and mentally worn out by exposing her history. “That’s it. I know how it feels to be abandoned by a parent as a child. I know how it feels to have no confidant, even within your closest family. I know how it feels when the ones who are supposed to be guiding you into adolescence turn out to be wolves in sheep’s clothing. And if the result of me having gone through all this trauma is that I can prevent these three kids from having to suffer the same, then, well, it wasn’t all for naught, now, was it?” Tammy sighed deeply. “And now, if you would excuse me, I will peek at the damage you’ve done to the bedroom, and hope nothing is ablaze by now upstairs.” 

She didn’t wait for any objections, and lept up the stairs instead, shushing the younger kids away that were filled with questions. Her duty here was done now, should Lexie and her mother take care of the children for once. She had done enough education for the day. 

Tired, and spent, Tammy let herself fall onto the bed, examining the minor damage. A few burn marks, the door had nasty scratch-like marks that would sooner or later be blamed on poor Xena, and surely, there was a weird atmosphere in the room, like helium having been let free. But if that was all there was to it, she’d be satisfied. She was sure she wouldn’t have been able to stand another home burned down, and neither would Lexie and her mother have survived this, had worst come to worst. 

Tammy glanced around, finding the corpus delicti, the bass guitar of Lexie’s mom, still standing in the corner, untouched by the quarrel around it. Smiling, she grabbed it, intending to fool around a bit with the chords. 

She didn’t even get to touch the strings before she heard something. Or rather, she _thought_ she heard something, she really couldn’t be sure. It felt too much like a product of her imagination, a figment, really, to be real. She shook her head, trying to clear it of that strange sound. 

Yet, as soon as her fingertips stroke the strings again, it was there, too. That guffawing that felt way too familiar to be unreal, and yet, too far away to be of this world, either. Again, Tamara shook her head, but by now, she was suspicious. And she had spend enough time with psychics not to have her speculations dismissed this easily. 

“Lexie?” She called out loudly, hoping that her girlfriend had decided to take care of the children first and had gotten up the stairs therefore. “Lexie, could you come around please? I have…” She looked around, still shaking her head as she wasn’t sure what she actually wanted, much less how she wanted to word it. “I have a question of sorts…” She finally settled on the inquiring approach. 

Yet, in the end, it was all for the naught, as she never got to pose her question. 

Lexie had barely walked into the room, when her gaze was encaptured by the full-length mirror behind Tamara, and the guitarist would have believed her girlfriend to have frozen to death, if that hadn’t been entirely impossible in the summer heat, when Lexie uttered a single, incredulous word. 

“Mom?”


End file.
